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gUXITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



MR. FOX'S SPEECH. 



THE 

SPEECH 

OF THE HONORABLE 

CHARLES JAMES X, 

ON THE MOTION FOR 

AN EN2UIRY 

INTO THE 

STATE OF THE NATION, 

On the 25th of March, 1801. 

TO WHICH TS ADDED 

AN APPENDIX, 

ILLUSTRATING SOME PASSAGES OF THE SPEECH, 

AND CONTRIBUTING TO THE 

MEANS OF FORMING A FULL JUDGMENT 

UPON THE 

Most Momentous QUESTIONS that agitate the Public 

IN THE PRESENT CRISIS. 




LONDON: 

PRINTED BY S. HAMILTON, 

Falcon-Court, Fleet-Street ; 

4AND SOLD BY J. DE BRETT, PICCADILLY, 

AND BY MESSRS. ROBINSON, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 

Price 2 s. 6d, 



•t-7 



MR. FOX'S 

SPEECH 

ON THE 

STATE OF THE NATION. 



HOU,SE OF COMMONS, 

Die Mercurii, a5° Martii, 1801°. 

JL HAT this houfe refolve itfelf into a com- 
<c mittee, to confider of the ftate of the nation," 
was moved by Mr. Grey, after a fpeech of very 
great eloquence. 

To Mr. Grey, Mr. Dundas replied at 
length ; and concluded with giving a negative 
to the motion. 

Lord Temple fupported the motion ; avowing, 
however, his approbation of Mr. Pitt's mi- 
ni ftry. 

Two or three other members, panegyrics of 
the former, as well as the prefent, adminiftration^ 
fpoke both for and againft the queftiom 



o 



About half pad: nine Mr. Pitt rofe, and, in 
an eloquent fpeech, refilled Mr. Grey's motion 
till twelve o'clock, 

WHEN MR. FOX addreffed the houfe, in 
fubftance nearly as follows: 



" LATE as the hour is, (it was pad midnight) I 
(hall beg leave, even under the defignation of 
' a nezv member? by which the honorable gen- 
tleman (Mr. Pitt) has complimented me, ta 
avail myfelf of the indulgence which the houfe 
ufually (hews to perfons of that description ; and, 
unw r illing as I am to trefpafs long upon your 
attention, it will be difficult to difmifs very fhortly 
the whole of the arguments that apply to the 
queftion before the houfe ; efpecially after the 
confufed ftate in which the honorable gentle- 
man's fpeech has left the real matters at iflue, 
and that laborious complication which renders 
it not an eafy tafk to methodize a reply, or put 
one's argument into a plain and diftinct order. 

" Firft, I fhall take the liberty of adverting to 
that part of the honorable gentleman's fpeech 
(certainly not the moft folid or fplendid part of it) 
which relates perfonally to myfelf; and of which 
the introduction, upon the prefent occafion, is a 
flecifive proof how bereft of real defence the 
honorable gentleman muft fee! himfelf, whe* 



3 



lie is driven to the expedient of reviving a cir- 
cumrtance which has but little analogy to the 
point before you ; and which, when explained 
and underftood, will lend not the leaft fanftion 
or fupport to the fyftem of his majefty's late 
minifters, refpefting the queftion between this 
country and the Northern powers. 

t: I certainly did, in my capacity of fecretary of 
ftate, offer, by his majefty's commands, to the 
Emprefsof R'lflia in the year 1782, the recogni- 
tion of the principle in queftion, for the purpofe 
of inducing that princefs to enter into a clofe alli- 
ance with this country. In rejecting the infinuation, 
o^ this propofal being my fole aft, let me not be 
underftood to (brink from that meafure as ' rafh 
and inconfiderate :' on the contrary, I avow and 
affirm that it was molt wife, timely, and judici- 
ous; but for the fake of truth let it be remem- 
bered that the meafure which it fell officially to 
my lot to propofe to the court of Ruflia, at the 
time alluded to, was of courfe the meafure of 
the king's whole council, and not mine; which 
council confuted of many of the greateft names 
in the country, fuch as the Marquis of Rock- 
ingham, Lord John Cavendish, the Duke 
of Richmond, the Marquis of Lansdown, 
Lord Seppell, &c.&c. — it was, in a word, the 
act of an adminiftrat-ion which has been the leaft 
cenfured,and the moft praifed,of any that exifted 
during the king's reign. 

" The honorable gentleman challenges any 
perfon to difcufs the queftion with the neutral 
powers, as 4 a ftatefman or a lawyer :'— now, 
though I can venture to touch the matter only 

s 2 



in the fird of thefe characters, I can affure the 
houfe that the conceffion, whatever it was, of 
the miniftry, which 1 offered as our joint adl: to 
the Emprefs of Ruffia in the year 1782, and fo 
often alluded to by the honorable gentleman, 
had the concurrence of as great lawyers as ever 
diftinguifhed this country at any one period ; 
for whatever may have been the other defects of 
that fhort adminiftration, in it there certainly was 
no want of eminent lawyers. No lefs than three 
of the luminaries of that profeffion, namely,. 
Lord Ashburton, Lord Camden, and Lord 
Thurlow, were members of that cabinet ;. and 
far enough from thinking that the offer then 
made to the Ruffian court ' laid at the feet of 
that government all the fources of the naval 
greatnefs of this country/ to repeat the rant of 
the honorable gentleman, thefe learned and 
noble perfons, together with the whole body 
of that adminiftration, w T ere profoundly con- 
vinced, not that what we offered was flight 
and trifling, but that, important as it was, 
it would have been highly to the advantage of 
this country, that our propofal had been adopted 
by the government of Ruffia.' 

'f In making this offer, I was fo far from being 
myfterious, — fo little apprehenfion did we feeL 
that our propofition to Ruffia would involve 
our country in any of the perils from other 
powers which the fatuity of the honorable gen- 
tleman's (Mr. Pitt's) miniftry has brought upon 
it, that,.inftead of fending through the more 
ufual channel of our ambaffador at that court, 
who, if I miftake not, was Lord Malmesbury, 
I applied here directly to Mr. Sim ox in, the 
Ruifian minifter at this court, and with him en- 



deavoured to accomplish the negotiation. To 
him I offered a quid pro quo — and meant to give 
nothing without getting a full equivalent. I 
wifhed to feparate Ruffia entirely from any con- 
nexions injurious to Great Britain* and to attach 
that power folidly and permanently to this coun- 
try. The honorable gentleman has dwelt with 
fome farisfacYion upon the expreffions of my 
letter to Mr.SiMOLiN. He has the advantage 
over me, of having lately read that letter in the 
office — (by the way, if that letter be a docu- 
ment for arguing the prefent difpute in this 
houfe, this houfe fhouJd have a copy of that 
Jetter) — and feems ftrangely enough to think 
that he derives fome pretext for his own policy, 
in my defcription of the magnitude of our pro- 
pofed conceffions in 1782. Why, what would the 
honorable gentleman, or any other man, think 
of me, if I wrote otherwife than he tiates me to 
have written upon that occafion ? 

u If he were negotiating with France about the 
Surrender of that Belgium, the retention of which 
he had fo lately made zjine qua non> would he begin 
by undervaluing and underftating the extent, 
fertility, and population of thofe provinces. — I, of 
courfe, did not begin by depreciating to the go- 
vernment of Ruffia the very boon I was tender- 
ing as an inducement to a great and beneficial 
.alliance. 

" The honorable gentleman rejoices in the fail- 
ure of that negotiation ; — in as much as its fuc- 
cefs would have enabled Ruffia to protect the 
commerce of France, and been the means of 
S3 



6 



preventing this country from annihilating it, in 
the prefent war. What ! Ruflia aflift the com- 
merce of France ? Ruflia ! the loudeft in thun- 
dering its maledictions againft the French revo- 
lution — the firft to profefs its zeal in the crufade? 
— the very power who formally waved this neu- 
tral principle, declaring that all general prin- 
ciples mould yield to the fuperior object of over- 
throwing c regicide republicanifm,' and every 
thing elie with which the royal coalition had 
ftigmatifed the French in this war? As to the 
deftrucYion of the French trade, is it certain that 
all the efforts of all the combined powers, or any 
poffible effect arifing from the moft fuccefsful 
affertion of what the government of England is 
now contending for, have hurt the commerce of 
France, fo much as its own disorganizations of all 
kinds upon that fubjecl fmce the period of the re- 
volution ? I believe not. Befides, do you fet down 
for nothing the captures made by your own fleets? 

e< In a word, the honorable gentleman will find 
nothing in the meafure, to which he has alluded 
with fo ludicrous a triumph, to countenance the 
fyflem he has purfued towards the Northern 
powers — to the confideration of which I (hall 
now proceed, having laid this much in relation 
to what the honorable gentleman has directed fo 
perfcnaliy at myfelf. 

" The qjjestion with the Northern 
powers has been divided by the honorable 
gentleman into five parts. Thefe five I fhall 
render into three; namely, Free bottoms mak- 
,l g J ree K 00 d$ — The contraband of war — The right 



of fear ch under convoy. Thefe three beads (com- 
prehending the collateral and dependent ques- 
tions of blockade, and the carrying of the coajling 
and colonial trade of belligerents, by abufe of the 
firft and third propofition) form the eflence of 
the prefent difpute with the Northern powers, 
and which, in common acceptation, is called 
' the neutral principle? 

u Whether this neutral principle be Jacobinical 
or not, its origin is certainly of more antiquity 
than fhe French revolution, being as old as the 
middle of the laft century, and having for its 
patron and propounder no lefs a republican than 
Frederick the Great. That prince was un- 
doubtedly -a philofopher, and by fome deemed 
not quite orthodox in his theology. This neu- 
tral principle might therefore with as much rea- 
fon be called deiftical as Jacobinical 5 and if the 
honorable gentleman (Mr. Pitt) had now been 
in as high favour with the church as in pall: 
times, poihbly he might get this point, for which 
the powers of the North are contending, 
branded with fome fuch epithet by ecclefiaftical 
authority ; in the fame manner as, towards the 
end of the feventeenth century, the univerfity 
of Oxford declared that the principles which led 
to the afifertion and confervation of the Britifh 
conftitution, and which feated the prefent royal 
family upon the throne of England, were ' doc- 
trines tending to atheifin.' The one imputation 
is as juft as the other; and jacobinifm applies 
with exactly as much truth to the neutral quef- 
tion, as atheifm to the principles of the Englifh 
revolution. In reality, fir, the honorable gen- 

M 



' 8 

tleman's indifcriminate cry of Jacobin ! jacobin ! 
to every thing and perfon that he dislikes, has 
brought an utter contempt upon this continual 
cant. He has worn it out ; — and all the terrors 
he would conjure up from it are become an 
abfolute bugbear. With far more grace and 
likelihood might this term c jacobin' be retorted 
upon himfelf, and feveral indeed of his own 
meafures, — of which one of the mod recent 
might, perhaps, in the judgment of many (though 
I am not difpofed fo to defcribe it), be confidered 
as ftrictly fuch : I mean the honorable gentle- 
man's late communication to the catholics of 
Ireland, upon the event of his resignation. 

cc The next afTertor of this neutral queftion 
was that implacable zealot in Jacobinical faith, 
that virulent propagator of revolutionary doc- 
trines, the late Emprefs of Russia ; who, in 
the year 1780 and 1781, entered, with all the 
other Northern powers, into a confederacy, dif- 
fering, I apprehend, in nothing from that which 
the honorable gentleman has ftigmatifed fo co- 
pioufly this night ; except, as I underftand, 
by fome additional precautions in the recent 
league. 

* c Now, would any body believe that this ho- 
norable gentleman, in his capacity of cabinet 
minifter, ihould, in lefs than two years after that 
confederacy was formed, avail himfelf of the me- 
diation of thofe very powers between this country 
and its enemies; and that preliminaries of peace 
(negotiated by an administration of which he 
himfelf was a part) mould be actually figned 



9 



under the aufpices of that very Emprefs oir 
Russia, the grand authorefs of what he now 
calls ■ Jacobinical, revolutionary principles, vio- 
lative of treaties, fubverfive of the law of 
nations, ftarting a code of new and mon*- 
ftrous maxims,' and all the other ftrong abufe 
which, in the prodigality of his inve£lives, he 
has caff upon this new alliance, — a mexefac- 
fimile of the old : — and after all what docs this 
prove? but that the honorable gentleman's ob- 
loquies now are of juft as much value as his 
encomiums laft year upon the ' magnanimity' 
of fome of thefe very powers, — both the one and 
the other being mere noife, and fignifying 
nothing. 

"However, fir, regarding the flrfi: formation of 
this confederacy in the year 1780 and 178 1, the 
honorable gentleman fays that this court, though 
too weak to refill it by force, never admitted 
the principle of that confederacy; and that lord 
Stormont protefted againft it. 

<( Here let me remark, that the oppofition of 
that day, like this of the prefent, had their cant 
reproaches vented by the fupporters of the one 
adminiftration as well as the other. How could 
we be always right, they faid, who always op- 
pofed the right and the wrong r — or if we con- 
curred, then it was ' a fit of candor.' The truth, fir, 
is, that neither did we then, nor do we now, com- 
plain, but from a full conviction that we had juft 
caufe. Even the honorahie gentleman has had 
our votes when we confcientioufly felt that we 
could agree with- him ; and, notwithstanding all 
the heat of party at the period of the American 



10 



-war alluded to, not a breath of blame did we 
throw upon the minifters of thofe days for their 
difcreet and meafured conduct refpe£ting the 
confederacy at that period formed by the neutral 
powers. In that 'fit of candor/ iffuch it was, 
the honorable gentleman himfelf was with us; 
but he is now quite fure that what he then 
thought good fenfe and good management was 
owing to zveaknefs.-r-ln nothing were the ho- 
norable gentleman and J (who then acted to- 
gether) more of one mind, than in general 
cenfure of that adminiftration ; againft their con- 
duel, in this cafe, however, we murmured not 
one word : for, without conceding any necef- 
fary point, we thought their difcretion, in that 
infrance, faved this country from a war with the 
Northern powers ; and our naval hiftory from that 
period vouches that their caution did not facrifice 
the fources of our maritime greatnefs, which, ac- 
cording to the honorable gentleman, mud be the 
inevitable confequence. That government did 
not revolt the feelings of Europe by fending its 
fleets to a feeble power, to carry by force what 
it tnight obtain by argument ; nor did it fol- 
low the example of capricious defpotifm in lay- 
ing embargoes upon Danifh and Swedifh pro- 
perty in Britilh ports. Thefe improvements in 
diplomacy, thefe encouragements to commerce, 
have been referved for the honorable gentleman. 

" New, with regard to the fir ft of the three 
branches into which 1 have divided the heads 
of my argument, if any perfon is anxious for 
my opinion, I have no heutation in faying, that, 
as a general proportion, * free bottoms do not 
make free goods;' and that, as an axiom, it is 



11 



fupported neither by the law of nations nor of 
common fenfe. The law of nations is but a 
body of regulations, founded upon equal juftice, 
and applying equally to all nations for the com- 
mon intereft of all. If a ftate of war did not in- 
volve its own inconveniences, the temptations 
to warwould be endlefs, and might keep nations 
in perpetual mifery. It is therefore for the ge- 
nera] advantage that belligerents £liouId feel the 
injuries of abridged and reftricted trade, becaufe 
it is an inducement to peace ; — and if, on the 
other hand, the commerce of a power at war, as 
well as the materials of offence, could be legally 
carried on by a neutral, the benefit of maritime 
preponderance would be wholly loft — a thing 
as much at variance with common fenfe, as it 
would be repugnant to reafon, that mere naval 
fuperiority (hould defpife every rule of relative 
juilice, and, by bare-faced power, make its own 
will the law of the ocean. 

'.* The only difficulty would be, which to con- 
demn as moft monftrous, — a neutral, pretending 
io the right of fupplying one belligerent with all 
the means of mifchief to another; or a bellige- 
rent, infilling upon an udverfal right of fearch 
in alj cafes, and making innocent commerce the 
fport of its whim, in exprefs contempt of fpe- 
cific regulation. It is between thefe extremes 
that the general intereft of the commonwealth 
of nations finds the true equitable medium - 3 as 
fhe numberlefs treaties between the different 
ftates of Europe fufficiently demonftrace. 

" From thefe treaties the moft. general inference 
is, for the general freedom of commerce] but 



12 



every one of them contains exceptions to, and 
qualifications of, this principle; which, though 
general, is not univerfal. 

fC So much with regard to ' free bottoms mak- 
ing free goods ;' which, however, is not the 
queftion at ifiue between this court and the neu- 
tral powers ; becaufe, if it were, it would ex- 
clude all confideration of the two other heads of 
this difcuffion ; namely, ' the contraband of 
war,' (a point not difputed, as I underftand, by 
the Northern powers) and ' the right of fearch/ 
which, under certain limitations, is exprefsly 
recognized. 

" The contraband of war* is the mere crea- 
ture of convention ; the very articles which are 
declared ' contraband' with one power being 
■ innocent commerce' with another. This point, 
thus varying and contradictory, the honorable 
gentleman would reduce into fomething wonder- 
fully iimple. Inftead of refting it upon the fpe- 
cific text of a treaty, he would make it depend 
folely upon the will of the ftrongeft. He knows 
far better than they who negotiated them, what 
the treaties meant. Thus, if naval materials 
were defined as lawful commerce, in fome 
treaties, the honorable gentleman fays they were 
not prohibited as contraband, only becaufe the 
contracting nation at that time did not trade in 
fuch articles. So, too, if in the treaty with Hol- 
land of 1674*, 'hemp, flax, and pitch 5 ropes, 
fails, and anchors; mails, planks, boards, beams, 
of what fort of wood foever, and all other materials 

* See Appendix, N° I. 



13 



for building or repairing (hips/ are, in the very 
words of the treaty, declared to be ' wholly free 
goods, wares, and commodities* as exprefsly con- 
tradiitinguifhed from contraband, — the hono- 
rable gentleman gives you two unanfwerable 
reafons why you mould hold thefe treaties as 
nothing in this difcuflion : — Firft, fays he, be- 
cause it was not then forefeen that fuch things 
could be implements of war. Secondly, or if it 
had been forefeen, the exclufion of fuch articles 
from * contraband, in favour of the Dutch, does 
noc affect the general principle, in as much as 
4 the Dutch were likely to be always allies of this 
country, or at lead friendly.' And the firft of 
thefe powerful arguments he ftrengthens by a 
very fine hypothecs : — ' Suppofe/ adds the ho- 
norable gentleman, * gunpowder had been in- 
vented fubfequent to any treaty in which it was 
not declared to be contraband, what fort of a 
minifter would he be who would admit a neutral 
power to afTift his enemy with gunpowder, 
merely becaufe it happened not to have been 
difcovered when the contraband of war had 
been fettled with fuch neutral ?' Excellent 
illustration! Why, fir, in fuch a cafe we mould 
have all faid the fame thing; — but how con- 
temptible is it to imply the prefent to be 
fuch a cafe 1 What an honour to the clofe of 
the eighteenth century to have found out, 
not exactly the invention of gunpowder, but 
that ' hemp, pitch, ropes, fails, anchors, and 
mails/ are become implements of war, winch 
they were not in 1654 and 1674 1 What a mira- 
culous talent of expounding treaties mull not 
that honorable gentleman be gifted with, who 
would make thofe articles contraband to the reft 



14 



of the world which were declared free to the 
Dutchy becaufe it was confidered certain, in 1674, 
that the Dutch muft be always allies or friends 
of England ! — even the Dutch, who, within 
only twenty years before this treaty, waged three 
of the bloodieft wars with this country that it ever 
before fuftained with any naval enemy ! Are the 
names of De Ruyter and Fan Tromp fo forgotten, 
in 1674, that is to fay two years after the cefTation 
of war with Holland, that the hoftility of their 
country to this may not be as likely as its friend- 
fhip? And might not the glories of thefe cele- 
brated men afford fome diftant guefs, that ' hemp, 
pitch, ropes, fails, anchors, and mads,' were, in 
their life-time, implements of war? — Why, fir, 
can there be a clearer proof what the honorable 
gentleman thinks of this houfe, than his offering 
fuch an argument as this, in palliation of this new 
war, which his Wan tonne fs and want of the 
commoneft difcretion has brought upon the 
country ? 

cc From the words which I have quoted, you fee 
that thefe concefiions were made to Holland in 
the treaty of 1674. Nobody can be ignorant how 
that country availed itfelf of all its privileges, 
either of natural right or of treaty, during the 
Seven Years' war, as well as during that which 
was terminated at Aix-la-Chapelle. Throughout 
thefe wars, Holland carried every neutral right 
to its utmoft extent of exertion. Did all this 
exertion difable this country from crippling the 
marine of France during thefe contefts? Did 
it ? I afk the houfe : — and if this conceiiion, to 
fo induftrious, aclive, and indefatigable a race as 
the Dutch, the general carriers of Europe, pro- 



15 



duced neither facilities to France, nor injury to us, 
let me afk you, if there be a prudent man on 
earth who would have provoked extremities 
with Ruffia, a power that has fcarcely any car- 
rying trade whatever, about a point which, in 
the hands of the Dutch, w T as absolutely nugatory 
as to all thofe dangers which the propensity to 
this war has difcovered and magnified ? 

" But the honorable gentleman flatters himfelf 
that he has found out fomething aufpicious to 
his caufe, in recollecting that I condemned, at 
the time of the French commercial treaty in 
1787, your granting this very point to France* 
What a caufe of triumph for the honorable gen- 
tleman ! — That I cenfured,as mod undoubtedly I 
did, theceffion of a principle to a country which 
the experience of ages proved to be a kind of 
natural enemy in all your wars, — which you denied 
to one that fcarcely ever was againfl you, and 
which every maxim of honed Engliih policy fhould 
promptyou to cultivate asa fort ol natural friend, — 
I dreaded not ib much the direct as the indirect 
ufe that France might make of fuch a didin&ion 
in her favor; and 1 objected to and reprobated 
your yielding that to Lewis the XVI. which 
you peremptorily refufed to Catharine the 
Second. If I underftand what it is to be right 
and confident, I was fo in my difcrimination 
upon this point, in that difcuilion ; and I am 
ignorant of the meaning of rhe words, if the 
honorable gentleman's animadverfion this night 
be not as weak, trifling, and fallacious, as were 
his original arguments at the time he made 
this furrender. 



16 



'* So much then as to the two firfl branches of 
this queftion with the neutral powers. 

cc With refpect to the third point, the matter 
of 'fearcti — that, under found and difcreet limi- 
tations is certainly a right of belligerents; but, 
pufhed to extremity, it becomes, like many 
other rights, a grofs wrong. The right of fearch, 
as on the one hand it does not reft merely on un- 
written law, fo neither on the other is it a matter 
to be arbitrarily exercifed. The thing, as well as 
the manner, is defined by ftrict ftipulation*. As 
to the claim of convoy, beyond all doubt, if the 
privilege of convoy Were abufed in protecting the 
trade of our enemy, that would be a very fit fub- 
jecl'of reprefentation. As far as we are acquainted 
with the precautions intended by the Northern 
powers, they feem to have been fully aware of 
fuch a poflible fraud f ; and there is nothing of 
this fort which, in my opinion, remonftrance and 
reafon were not capable of fettling. Even the 
prefence of convoy would not prevent fearch, 
and juftifiably too, in what the treaties call 
c cafes of lawful fufpicion;' — but, after all, your 
final fatisfaction may as well depend upon 
the convoy as the (hip's documents. A 
found difcretion will be influenced by the na- 
ture of the cafe. It is not ' fearch upon law- 
ful or urgent fufpicion,' fo well provided for in 
different treaties, that makes any part of the 
queftion ; it is the unqualified ademption of an 
univerfal right to fearch in all poflible cafes, or, 
in other words, fubje&ing the commerce of the 

* See Appendix, N° II. f Id. N° III. 



17 



World to wayward, vexatious, haraffing, intuit- 
ing interruptions and inquiries, without flint or 
diftin&ion. — This is the grievance ; and, to 
judge of its juftice, I afk you, Would you en- 
dure fuch treatment yourfelves from any (late 
upon earth ? Would you ? There is no prin- 
ciple by which you can fo well attain the know- 
ledge of relative juftice, as to put yourfelf into 
the place of another, and decide upon another by 
yourfelf. The extent of what you contend for 
would, if retaliated, lay at the difcretion of any 
petty power, not only all the free courfe of your 
trade, but alfo the proud fpirit and the high 
feeling which fo naturally belong to your naval 
afcendency. Suppofe the king of Spain at war 
with Algiers. If a cafe can be imagined more 
likely than another to reconcile you to this humi- 
liation, it would be, I fuppofe, in favour of a 
Chriftian king of Spain, contending with pirates, 
and robbers, and infidel barbarians. A Britifh 
fleet of merchantmen, in the lawful purfuits of 
trade, to your own iflands, for inftance, of Mi- 
norca or Malta, or deftined to any other of the 
Mediterranean ports, though convoyed by a 
fquadron of Englifh men of war, would, accord- 
ing to thefe arguments, be liable to be flopped, 
ranfacked, teafed, and infulted, by the meaneft 
cutter in the Spanifh navy. Such would be the 
fate to which your own maxims would expofe 
you, unlefs you frankly acknowledge that you 
have one meafure for yourfelves, and another 
for the reft of the world. Whatever the fliifting 
gale of luck and fortune may fuggefl to feeble 
minds, be affured that juftice is the beft policy, 
and the founded principle. 

c 



18 



" Notwithstanding all the phlegm with which 
the honorable gentleman has ftigmatifed the 
three maritime ftates in this Northern confede- 
racy, not one word has he uttered, as my ho- 
norable friend (Mr. Grey) has well obferved, 
3gainft the King of Pruffia, one of the moft 
Strenuous parties in this league. — If the genius 
of the honorable gentleman's government were 
yet to be truly chara£terifed, his conduct in re- 
fpedt to this prince puts it in the moft glaring 
colours. Not only all the wrong that may, in 
the opinion of many people, clog the queftion, 
but that which is the very pith and marrow of the 
whole difpute, the honorable gentleman has, by 
the reftoration of the capture in the Texel, given up 
to the king of Pruffia. Why? — Becaufe, fafe from 
the attacks of the Britilh navy, the King of Pruflia 
has the means of injury in his turn. What does 
all this demonftrate, but that the honorable gen- 
tleman is ready to give up every thing to force, 
and nothing to reafon. Inflead of fparing the 
feeble, and pulling down the proud, he bows 
down to the mighty, and tramples upon the weak. 
With Denmark, vulnerable at all points, the 
Hon. Gentleman will not even confer, without 
a Britifh fleet ; but every thing is made a peace- 
offering to the King of Pruflia *. 

<c My honorable friend (Mr. Grey) has truly 
and wifely faid, that he was not called upon to 
difcufs the queftion in difpute as a general prin- 
ciple. Certainly not; — the bringing it to the 
prefent iflue is the very perfection of impolicy. 
* What!' anfwers the honorable gentleman (Mr. 

* See Appendix, N° IV. 



19 



Pitt) * were we to give that up which Lord 
Stormont protefted againft in the year 1780?' 
Who wanted him to give it up ? Where lay the 
neceffity of either admitting or rejecting it? A 
cautious; a difcreet, and meafured line of conduct 
had faved the queftion from public difcuffion, and 
Europe from this new war. The greateft naval 
fuccefs cannot obtain more real advantage for you 
than you might have derived from prudence — 
whilft failure, if you fail, would make your dif- 
grace tenfold. Granting you all that you look 
to, from arms, are you a bit nearer to your end ? 
Suppofe you feparate Denmark from this con- 
federacy — Humbled to the earth, admitting that 
ihe apologife for her conduct, is the pretention, 
therefore, at reft for ever? Do what you will, the 
claim will not be extinguiftied by the fubmiifion, 
but will revive with the means of enforcing it *. 

"Upon the whole of this bufinefs, what is the 
obvious inference, but that thofe who fancy 
fome ftrange intereft in this dreadful trade of 
war — feeing jacobinifm, and all their other pre- 
texts for its duration, grown ftale and difgufting 
— have manoeuvred to afTociate with the national 
enthufiafm in favor of its navy, a point in which 
its real interefts are but little involved ; have en- 
deavoured to draw from the public predilection 
for that fervice, fo natural and fo well deferved, 
perhaps the means of advancing fome new plan 
or fpeculation no way connected, as upon former 
occafions, with the profeded object. Foes or 
neutrals, what is fo probable or fo plaufible to 
be urged, by jacobins and others, as that thefe 

* See Appendix, N° V. 
C 2 



20 



honorable gentlemen, who have no character for 
pacification, and have yet juft as much as their 
conduct merits, have fallen, as it were, upon this 
lucky queftion in good time to roufe the expiring 
energies of the country into new offers of lives 
and fortunes, for an object that may feem nearer 
and dearer to them than the further prolongation 
of the war with France — the great fuccefs of 
which its late conductor has, this night, fo mi- 
nutely detailed to you. 

i( Now, fir, let us proceed to confider this 
fuccefs. 



cc The honorable gentleman (Mr. Dundas) 
refifts this motion, this night, in a way which, 
though not wholly new from the fame quarter, 
"brings, with every repetition of the fame argu- 
ment, fome frefh caufe for aftonifhment. 

fe The alledgment 'thaj; this war has been fuc- 
cefsful ' is not made now by that honorable gen- 
tleman, for the firft time, it is true -, but then 
his recurrence to former, I will not fay c explod- 
ed/ but too frequently urged, and as frequently 
refuted, reafonings, is compenfated by fome- 
thing quite untouched in pad difcuffions. It 
now feems that this war was undertaken for 
the purpofe of c conquering the colonies and 
deftroying the commerce of France.' The re- 
itoration of monarchy — the overthrow of jacobin 
principles — the. abatement of France, and con- 
fining her to her ancient limits — the balance of 
power — the caufe of law, order, and religion 
—all thefe are gone byj and the fplendid 



21 



reveries, that were foothed by fuch con- 
templations, are fallen, alas ! and funk down 
to the capture of {hips and of tropical fettle- 
ments. In this view of things the honorable 
gentleman ventures to compare the fuccefs of 
the prefent with that of the Seven Years' war, 
and finds great confolation in difcovering, that 
even in that glorious contention there had been 
fome reverfes — alluding particularly to Minorca 
and to Rorhefort. With fome portion of triumph 
he refers to thefe misfortunes, and applies his 
difcovery, in rather a lingular manner, as an 
argument to the prefent queition ; for he gives 
you this piece of hiftory as a reafon againfi 
going into any enquiry regarding the failures of 
the prefent war. 

<£ Mod unfortunately for the honorable gentle- 
man, the very misfortunes to which he has ad- 
verted were inftantly followed by enquiries in 
this houfe. It has been referved for the prefent 
war, though the mod: difgraceful in its external, 
and the mod wretched in its dorneftic confe- 
quences, of any that this country ever waged, 
to be the only war in which this houfe never 
faw any grounds for retrofpe£t or revifion. All 
the collefied calamities of all their predeceflbrs, 
for ages, do not equal, either in kind or number, 
the exploits, during the prefent war, of the ad- 
miniftrationjuft retired from office; yet they are the 
only men ever poffefTed of the powers of govern- 
ment in this country, who never, even in a fingle 
inftance, yielded to any enquiry, upon any part 
of the innumerable and varied difgraces that 
have marked the laft nine years. — So unlucky 
is the honorable gentleman in the cafe of MU 

c 3 



22 



norca, that every thing refpecting that bufinefs 
makes directly againd him. To whatever caufe 
the lofs of that iiland may be attributable^ this 
houfe immediately enquired into the caufe. A 
perfon for whofe memory I have the deeped 
gratitude and love *, then one of the king's mi- 
niders, far from refilling, as the honorable gen- 
tleman refills, was the moil eager in infifting upon 
enquiry. Unlike the prefent times, the Houfe of 
Commons, then, had not been tutored into 
that confidence in miniflers which diilinguimes 
later periods; and the parliamentary enquiries 
that followed the failures to which the honorable 
gentleman alluded, fo far from embarraffing the 
operations of government, or unnerving the 
martial energies of the country, (thefe dale ob- 
jections to the approved and happy practice of 
our anceftors) were fucceeded by a feries of un- 
exampled renown. Such is the honorable gen- 
tleman's luck, in his hiftorical references ! 

" Not one word that I have ever uttered, or 
that ever came out of the lips of any friend of 
mine at this fide of the houfe, has tended, even 
in the mod diflant degree, to flur or under-rate 
the achievements of our fleets : and I will leave 
the houfe to judge whether any perfons, in it or 
out of it, have dwelt with more rapture upon 
the triumphs of that branch of the fervice than 
we have. — From this, however, the honorable 
gentleman drives to draw a defence of a nature 
truly lingular. He endeavours to intermingle 
with the glories of the navy the abfurdities of 
his own expeditions ; and afks, ' how the mili- 

* Lord Holland was Secretary of State in 1755. 



23 



tary plans can be all folly, and the naval all 
wifdom, both being advifed by the fame heads ?' 
— The queftion anfwers itfelf. It is in the 
nature of naval tactics, that a great deal de- 
pends upon the officers and men, upon winds 
and weather; — in land operations a good plan 
is almoft every thing. Yet the merit of the Ad- 
miralty is indifputable. It is true there are 
parts of the adminiftration,of Lord Spencer (for 
whom my perfonal refpect is confiderable) not 
free from blame, particularly what related to 
the invafions of Ireland ; but where the general 
fyftem has been judicious and profperous, it 
would be invidious to dwell upon a few errors. 
The honorable gentleman would incorporate 
thefe two fervices ; and is ready to take his 
fhare in the blame of the Admiralty, generoufly 
commuting the glories of his own department 
for their mifcarriages. Sir, every preemp- 
tion is in favor of the Admiralty: every proof 
againft him. Nobody afks about the merit 
of the Admiralty. It fpeaks for itfelf;— and 
equally obvious is the true character of the 
honorable gentleman's department. If all his 
expeditions have been marked by difcomfiture 
and difgrace ; if the failure of fome is aggravated 
by circumfcances too painful to touch upon ; if 
fuch armies, with the courage they are known to 
pofiefs, have produced only fuch effects, — the re- 
iult is infallible. It is but to name the enter- 
prizes, — and the information, the lkill, the vigor, 
and the ability of thofe who planned them, are 
as plain as demonftration could make them. No 
man will ever enquire about the wifdom that 
projected the expeditions to Quiherxm, to Flan- 

c 4 



24 

ders, to St. Domingo, to Holland, to Ferrol, to 
Cadiz, &c. Thefe things are paft all curiofity. 

" The honorable gentleman has another way 
of reconciling this houfe to his difafters. With 
a precifion that is quite ludicrous, and a gravity 
of face which, unlefs he were quite certain of 
his audience, would excite a fufpicion that he 
was mocking the houfe, he gives us the dates, 
to an hour, of the days on which his expeditions 
failed, when they landed, retreated, or capitu- 
lated : fometimes-it is the wind, and fometimes the 
rain, and fometimes the frofT, the fnow, the cold, 
the heat ; now it is too early, arid then it is too 
late :-^and to this notable narrative the houfe 
liftens, without once faying e tell us of a (ingle 
military enterprize in which you have fucceeded? 
and if you cannot, give us fome better reafon 
than your own words to believe that you are 
blamelefs. Let us enquire into the facts, and 
judge for curfelves.' The honorable gentleman, 
with this rnafs of defeats before his eyes, has 
the hardihood to talk of the fuccefs of this war; 
and thinks the enumeration of iilands and fettle- 
ments, and a fchedule of captured fhips and 
frigates, will blind the eyes and confound the 
understandings of men, fo as to be diverted from 
the only proper confederation, the only rational 
teft of comparative fuccefs, namely, the relative 
foliation of the two countries, (of which a word by- 
and-by) in point of power. This is the true cri- 
terion of fuccefs, even without recurring to all 
the former motives to this war — refloring mon- 
archy, and putting down atheifm and jaco- 
binifm, and God knows what. 



25 



cc Of the word diverfion, the honorable gentle- 
man gives us indeed a very curious illuftration. 

<c Up to this moment, I believe no man ever 
underftood any thing elfe by * military diverfion' 
but the drawing off, by means of a few, a 
larger number of your enemy, who might hurt 
you more in another quarter. The expedition to 
Holland, he tells us, had three objects in view, — 
the capture of the fleet — giving the Dutch an op- 
portunity of (baking off the yoke of France — and 
making a diverfion for our allies in Italy and on 
the Rhine. He alks, c Is it nothing to have ten 
mips of the line added to our own navy, which 
elfe would be at this moment a means of annoy- 
ing us in the hands of our enemy ?' Sir, in this, 
as in every other inftance, the Englilh navy did 
the duty affigned to it nobly ; and if the capture 
of the Dutch fleet was a primary object of that 
memorable expedition, that object was accom- 
piiihed without any neceffity of hazarding any 
land experiments, under the honorable gentle- 
man's aufpices ;— for, in point of fact, the fleet 
revolted and furrendered before the landing on 
the Helder-Point. 

" With refpecl to the fecond objecl, namely, 
'"giving the Dutch an opportunity of (baking off 
the yoke of France,' how the Dutch felt and 
feel at this hour, with what horror they re- 
ceived your proffered releafe from their bondage, 
and the execration with which they load your 
name, it is unneceffary to date. But in the third 
and grand point, that of a diverfion in favor of 
our allies, there we" did wonders. 



26 



u If Europe were fearched,not a place could be 
found fo well calculated, for enabling a fmaller to 
combat alarger army, as this felecled fpot. To this 
fatal neck- of land did that honorable gentleman 
devote thirty thoufand Britimfoldiers,and (whiUi, 
aggravated by the derifion of Europe, this coun- 
try had the mortification of feeing a Britifh army 
purchafe its efcape from an army much inferior 
to itfelf, by the delivering up of eight thoufand 
picked feamen) fo fignal was the benefit to our 
allies of this precious diverfion, that, about the 
very time that the Englim army was making that 
refpeclable retreat, the grand armies of our 
allies, under Hoize and Suwarrow, were broken, 
beaten, difperfed, and routed, never more to rally 
or unite. 

<e Such was the honorable gentleman's diver- 
Jion in Holland ! — fuch its effects ! 

" But his unconquered mind was not yet fub- 
dued enough from military expeditions. He 
propofed new fources of renown for thofe armies 
whofe happy deftiny it was to be at his difpofal. 
Becaufe he failed in the north, he was certain 
of fuccefs in the fouth ; and, fare enough, he 
difpatches a formidable force under Sir .Ralph 
Abercrombie, not as c a diverfion !' no, — this 
body was deftined to co-operate directly with the 
Auftrians in Italy. This armament, delayed, 
until any man of common fenfe muft have feen 
its total inutility towards its profefied object, 
arrives at Genoa, juft in time — for what ? to 
affift General Melas ? No, — but juft in time to 
have the earlieft intelligence of his total ruin. 
It fails into theroad of Genoa, to fail out again, and 



27 



efcapes into the Mediterranean at the very time 
the Auftrian garrifonin that capital pafles out to 
meet their defeated countrymen in the northern- 
moft parts of Italy. But was this co-operation 
defired by the Auftrians ? No fuch with is ex- 
prefled or felt. The honorable gentleman 
plainly enough lets us underftand the diretSl 
contrary. And was it thus that Britifh armies 
were accuftomed to be treated in former 
wars ? Was it in this way that Prince Eugene 
a&ed to the Duke of Marlborough ? What 
then is the fa£t ? but that the hitherto untarnim- 
ed reputation of our arms has fo fuffered under 
the baneful mifmanagement of his majefty's late 
minifters, that the co-operation of twenty thou) "and 
Englijhmen is fo flighted by our allies, that they 
deprecated their aid, refolved to touch nothing 
belonging to us — but our guineas. 

" Now, fir, as to the delay of this expedition 
to Italy, let me implore the attention of the 
houfe to the honorable gentleman's defence. 

(C With the fame admirable minutcnefs, as to 
days and dates, he tells you that this grand 
fcheme was determined on the 2 2d of February. 
On the 23d, he told it to the king. On the 24th 
he told it to the duke. On the 28th the duke 
told him fomething. .The honorable gentleman 
then reads two letters, the one from Sir Charles 
Stewart, the other from the Duke of York, 
in fupport of this part of his defence. — I have 
been called a nevy member this night ; and new 
and raw indeed mult i be, and wholly ignorant 
of the practice of this houfe, if I could hear, 
without reprobation, that which would have been 



£8 



fcouted and fpurned in the good times of the 
Englifh conftitution, — when a fpirit of juft 
jealoufy of its rights, and a proper fenfe of its 
independence, prevailed in this Houfe, inftead of 
a blind confidence in the executive government. 
In fuch times, no m milter would have dared to 
have read to the Houfe of Commons of England 
the garbled extracts, juft as fuited his own pur- 
pofe, of letters from general-officers, as anexcufe 
for mifcarriages, affecting in the nearer! and 
deareft fenfe the honour and interefts of the 
country. It is true that I have not been, for 
fome time, in habits of intercourfe with the il- 
luftrious perfon who is at the head of the army ; 
but greatly indeed muft he be changed from 
what I knew him, if he would not mark with 
his abhorrence this ftyle of palliation. For 
what is it? and what does it prove? — that, 
if there were nothing more than we have 
heard, his Royal Highnefs ought to be in- 
fcantly impeached. The national defence of 
England — its militia, is cut up by the roots; the 
general body of its officers is difgufted by the laws 
paft in 1799, which transferred to the line fo 
large a proportion of its beft difciplined men. 
Thefe men, leaving the militia a mere fkeleton, 
are incorporated with regular regiments, and em- 
barked for Holland; and, feven months after their 
firft embarkation to, and five months after their 
return from, that difaftrous enterprize, their 
commander-in-chief informs the executive go- 
vernment, if we are to believe the honorable 
gentleman, * that it will take full two months 
to difcipline them into fitnefs for aftual fer- 
vice !' 



29 



** Was there ever before fuch a defence as this, 
hazarded before an afTembly of rational men ? 

(< Thofe troops which, at the expenfe of the 
national militia of this country, were boafted as 
moil excellent in the fummer, are declared, in 
the beginning of the next fpring, to be good for 
nothing, without, at the leait, c two months' drill- 
ing and forming. They were, it feems, in the 
completed: ftate poffible for the field in Auguft ; 
i — but in the following February, even their 
leader, if we are to believe the war minifter, de* 
fcribes them as wholly ufelefs, unlefs they have 
fuch a length of time allowed them to be per- 
fected in their exercifes as defeated whatever 
hopes the redoubtable project to the Mediter- 
ranean might excite. To all this, the honorable 
gentleman adds, That the weather was too 
wet for field-days, and, when not wet, was 
very cold — the men had not even an opportunity 
of knowing their officers. 

cc Some little advantage of climate France 
polTeiles over this country -, — but never fure 
did any analyzer of atmofpheres conceive that 
the very weather which, in the one country, 
prevented foldiers from peeping out of their 
quarters, enabled the other to collect, and to 
create, from raw recruits, a perfect army, and 
to carry this army, fo created, over thefe mighty 
barriers, the patTage of which was one of the 
wonders of the ancient, and one of the doubts of 
the modern world. It was in that very weather, 
at the remembrance of which the honorable gen- 
tleman Olivers, that Bonaparte — but not un- 
til he had almoft pronrated himfelf, in his foli- 



30 



citations for peace, before the infatuated rulers 
of the unhappy nations at war with France— 
then it was, even in that weather, that this extra- 
ordinary man aftembled and animated the youth 
of France. He found good weather for field- 
days, and had time enough fo to drill and dif- 
cipline his new-raifed corps, as to break to pieces 
the veteran legions of Auftria, and in one day 
to recover all the conquefts of two fuccefsful 
campaigns. 

cc But had the honorable gentleman's expedi- 
tion been able to fail fooner \ — ' If the battle of 
Marengo had not been loft :• — <Buf — ' If — Why, 
iir,Ido not know what degree of fortune there may 
be in this battle, or in that battle ; but I believe 
the honorable gentleman never was more mif- 
taken than he would find himfelf, even in the 
event of Bonaparte's defeat at Marengo. 
Such were the precautions of that fruitful mind ; 
fo well did he arrange his meafures -, ib little did 
he, in truth, truft to mere fortune, that if, againft 
all probability, Marengo ' had been loft,' that 
mighty genius had fo formed and difpofed his 
refourees, that many and many a bloody battle 
muft have been gained by his enemies before they 
could have made much impreffion upon the in- 
comparable fyitem of his operations in Italy lait 
iummer. 

" I defy imbecillity itfelf to firing together a 
more motley pack of excufes than the honorable 
gentleman has laid before the houfe this night. 
Amflerdam had been taken, if Sir Ralph Aber- 
c r o m b i e had landed on the 1 6tb hiftead of the 21th 
of Auguft . — Sir Charles Stuart's difltke to the 



31 



Rujfians protracled Sir Ralph* s departure for the 
Mediterranean. — Ten thoufand Irifh militia were to 
Come to England^ and ten thoufand Englifh to go to Ire- 
land. — Some of the troops wanted their new coats — 
fome their arms. — One expedition failed on the §th of 
April, took fhelter on the i yh, and re failed on the 
2 At h.— It zvas defgned to ajjifl the Auflrians, but the 
Auftrians zvould not be affifted. — There was no plan or 
Concert between the two courts. — An account current 
with the Seven Years 1 zvar ; took more fhips than 
Lord ( ■hath am, an d more Wands. — St. Domingo 
zvas unhealthy arJ rather expenjive - 5 but it was a good 
market. — This zvar has opened worlds of nezv 
markets. — Returns, even to a man, of the nezv-raifed 
corps at Gibraltar, Minorca, Malta, Portugal; and the 
total of your force, novj and in 1797, with a moft 
comfortable exaclnefs. — The hiftory of England from 
1755/0 176 2 — from Sever ndroog to the Havannah ; — 
In a word, fuch a feries of infulting puerilities 
as no houfe of parliament was, ever before, 
entertained with, under the name of a defence. 

So much, for the prefent, of the late fecretary ; 
and now to proceed to another view of the 
fuccefs of this war. 

tc The late Chancellor of the Exchequer tells 
us, that he forbears going over the military ex- 
ploits, only becaufe his honorable friend (Mr. 
Dundas) has put thofe things in the cleareft 
light. He is equally pofitive as to ' the fuccefs of 
the war;' but, not to ufurp upon his truly fortu- 
nate colleague, he has his own peculiar inftances 
to detail of profperity, of comfort, and of multi- 
plied happinefs — all flowing in upon the country 
from his own more immediate department. 



32 



cc Quite fcandalifed at my honorable friend's 
ftatement of the magnitude of the national debt 
in confequence of this war, the honorable gen* 
tleman pares down its amount fince 1793 to the 
trifle of one hundred and sixty millions: 
and how? — by a mode furprifingly curious indeed. 
Firft, he cuts out the fifty-fix millions, for which 
the income-taxis mortgaged ; and next, he de- 
fires you to forget all that the fale of the land- 
tax has already purchafed, or may yet redeem. 
Alas, fir ! there is not a gentleman in this houfe 
who would rejoice more than I, that the income- 
tax was to be fet down for nothing ; and I can- 
not help admiring that frontlefs infenfibility 
under which the honorable gentleman paffes 
over a grinding import, that has ripped open the 
private concerns, and reduced the necefiary com- 
forts, of every man in England. The extinction 
of debt from the fale of the land-tax carries its 
own evil in its tail; and we might as well rejoice 
at our profperity from that meafure, as a private 
man would from paying his debts by bringing 
his eftate to the hammer. The debts in fo far 
may be paid ; but the ejlate is gone for ever. 
The honorable gentleman muft think his audience 
are children, when he attempts to cajole them 
by fuch a play upon words. 

" In reality, what is the date of the country 
upon this point ? 

cc From fuch a- population as that of Great Bri- 
tain, near forty millions fterling are annually 
wrung: to this add ten millions more for the 
poor-rates,' making together about fifty millions. 
The honorable gentleman has eftimated the land- 



33 



cd rental of England at twenty-five millions. 
Thus then, we pay, yearly, double the produce of 
the whole rental of the country, in rates and taxes ; 
a fum approaching very near the whole income 
of the country, taking the income-tax as the ba- 
rometer of its amount. Was any nation ever 
before in fuch circumftances ? If nothing elfe 
were ftated but this ifndifputed fact, is it not, of 
itfelf, a crying reafon for inquiry? Will the 
honorable gentleman tell us of any people that 
were (not in degree merely, but in kind or prin- 
ciple) in fuch a (late, fince the beginning of the 
world ? As to the finking fund, let it be always 
remembered that its effects, highly beneficial as 
they are, mutt depend upon the revenue keeping 
its level. If the revenue fails, the charm of the 
finking fund vanifhes into nothing. This, fir, is 
the true picture of our financial condition as 
a ftate ; and the condition of the people is ftriclly 
anfwerable to it. One fixth of all the fouls in 
England is fupportedby charity; and the.plight 
of a great proportion of thofe who contribute to 
their maintenance is but little better than that of 
the paupers whom they fuccour. How the hon. 
gentleman has nerves to fuftain him in venturing 
to talk of the happinefs of this country, would 
be incomprehenfible, if our long experience of 
him had not convinced us of the fondnefs with 
which he can furvey every act of his own. The 
repetition of his delufions, deludes even him- 
felf. He has indulged fo much in thefe falla- 
cious and fatal reveries, that he appears to have 
become his own bubble, and almoft to miftake 
for realities the phantafmas of his 'bewildered 
wits. Let him alk any of the members from 
Yorkfhire and Lancalhire, what the ftate is of 



54 



the manufacturers in thofe counties ; even thofe 
(looking at Mr. Wilberforce) of whom I may 
not think the beft, will not venture io deny the 
ftarving, diftracred condition of thofe great and 
populous diftricls. From them, he may receive 
an emphatical and decifive contradiction to his 
diftempered and pernicious fancies. 

u Thefe, fir, are fome of the internal effects of 
this war, which both the honorable gentlemen 
(Meflrs. Pitt and Dundas) venture to compare 
With former contentions againft France. We 
have taken more, they tell us, than even in the 
feven years war, and therefore this furpafTes that 
in fuccefs. Good God, fir, what an erTe£t. does 
a confidence in the votes of this houfe produce 
upon the understandings of men of abilities ! 

" To talk of this war, and that of the feven 
years !! s We have deftroyed the commerce of 
France — -we have taken their iflands,' fay you— 
But thefe, I fay, were not the objects of the war. 
If you have deftroyed the commerce of France, 
you have deftroyed it at the expenfe of near 
three hundred millions of debt. If you have 
taken the French iflands, you have made a boot- 
lefs capture ; for you are ready enough to re- 
ftore them as the price of peace. You have 
taken iflands — but you have, at the fame time, 
laid the houfe of Auftria proftrate at the feet of 
triumphant France. Have you reftored mon- 
archy ?— Its very hopes are intombed for ever. 
Have you deftroyed jacobinifm as you call it ? 
- — Your refiftance has made it ftronger than ever. 
Have you reduced the power of France ? — 
France is aggrandized beyond the wildeft dreams 



35 



of forme* ambition. Have you driven her within 
her ancient frontiers? — She has enlarged herfelf to 
the Rhine, and to the Alps * and added five mil- 
lions to her population in the centre of Europe. 
You had all the great dates of Europe for your 
allies againft France — what is become of them ? 
All that you have not ruined, are your deter- 
mined enemies. Where are the neutral powers ? 
Every one of them leagued with this very France 
for your deftruction. Could all this be chance ? 
— No, fir, it is the true fucceflion of effect to 
caufe. It is the legitimate irtue of your own 
fyftem. You began in foolifhnefs, and you end 
in mifchief. Tell me one fingle object of the 
war that you have obtained. Tell me one evil 
that you have not brought upon your country. 
Yet this houfe will not inquire. The honorable 
gentleman (Mr. Dundas) fays ' We have had 
more difficulties to encounter than any former 
government ; for we had conftantly thwarting us 
the implacable monfter, Jacobinifm.' Sir, jaco- 
binifm has, in it, no property, fo fure, as the 
honorable gentleman's fyftem, to propagate and 
confirm it. That fyftem has given to jacobinifm 
life and nutriment, ftrength and maturity, which 
it could not have derived from any other courfe* 
Bent upon crulhing every idea of any reform, 
they refolved to ftifle the once free genius of the 
Engliih mind, and fufpend fome of the moil: va- 
luable parts of the Englifh conftitution, rather 
than yield one jot. Hence their adminiftration is 
marked, in this country, by a fucceflion of infringe- 
ments upon the deareft rights of the people — by 
invafions and rebellions in another country. Th# 
parent fource of all thefe diforders is that bane- 
ful impolicy, in which both the honorable gen- 

D 2 



a 6 



o 



tlemen endeavour to implicate this houfe. ' All 
that we have done,' fays the honorable gentleman 
(Mr. Dundas), who, to be fure, is more a man 
of things, than words, e has been approved by all, 
except a miferable remnant* of this houfe,' (an ex- 
preffion which he ufes, I prefume, to (how, that 
though an ad of parliament may incorporate 
legiflatures^ it cannot unite languages - 3 ) and the 



* 1 wifh I may prevail upon 1117 reader to procure Mr. 
Bundas's fpeech, published by Mr. Rivington ; a fpeech 
which, I affure him, fuffers nothing in the report : and is, fo 
far, alas ! very unlike to this which he is now perufmg. That 
verfion of Mr. Dundas's arguments mod accurately omits the 
paflage to which the above part of Mr. Fox's fpeech refers ; 
and it is not fo much to blame the good tafte of the retrench- 
ment (if any difcretion is allowable in fuch cafes) that I make 
the obfervation, as to guard agamit. miftake, and prevent the 
reader's imagining that Mr. Fox was, in this part of the text, 
combating, not nonfenfe, but, inanity. 

Indeed, far from cenfuring Mr. Dundas for a practice 
which. Demofthenes, and Tully, and Mirabeau, and Burke, 
have fanclioned by their example, I wifh I could commend, 
for any thing like fimilar anxiety, the perfon whofe reafon- 
ings I am endeavouring to convey to the country upon a fub- 
ject of fuch intereft to its welfare 3 but of Mr. Fox this is an 
a 1 mo ft lingular certainty: not only that he never publiihed 
any of his fpeeches, but never lent the leaft afiifhnce (o any 
body who engaged to do fo, nor has at any time feen, either 
in manufcript or print, one fyllable that ever fell from his lips 
till it was before the world* 

.Againft any publications of parliamentary fpeeches there are 
undoubtedly authorities; but never yet has the writer heard 
one found argument to mow that a faithful tranfeript without, 
of the tranfactions within parliament, is not a great national 
advantage; Thoie who, aiming at all pofTible accuracy, give 
the debates to the public, in my opinion, are public bene- 
factors; and what their labour muft be who profeffionally 
teport them, I can feelingly imagine, even from this fample : 
though I have had more weeks to accomplish it, than they 
cften have hours to render a whole night's fpeaking. 

The Reporter. 



37 



ether gentleman is fo anxious to eftablifh the 
popularity of his fyftem, that he almoft re- 
proaches the houfe with coldnefs, in their fup- 
port of him. He complains that only ' /even 
eighths' of the members of this houfe were for 
his meafures, when he had c nine tenths' of the 
people. 

Cf If this were true of the people, they would 
almoft deferve their prefent fate; — but the drift 
of all this is obvious enough. This identifica- 
tion of himfelf with the houfe ; this laborious 
Shifting, as it were, of the honorable gentleman's 
own refponlibility upon their votes, is very intel- 
ligible ; and he fails into that clafllcal correcl- 
nefs which I have before noticed in his honor- 
able friend, in his great zeal to make that 
point clear. Though he has had three parlia- 
ments, chofen, one would have thought, pretty 
well to his tafte, he afferts that even the majori- 
ties of this houfe could not come up to the tone of 
the public, in favour of his meafures, which, he 
fays (thinking, however, with his honorable 
friend, that our oppofition was, at the fame time, 
an advantage to him), had the fandtion of all, 
but a few ' exploded opinions 9 in this houfe. 

" Exploded opinions," then, he defines to be, 
opinions which this houfe negatives by its ma- 
jorities. The honorable gentleman mud allow 
me to inform him, that his great and juftly re- 
vered father fpent the greater part of his life in 
the enforcement of fuch ' exploded opinions.' 
I muft remind him, that he himfeif (who has 
fince found fuch effectual means of giving cur- 
rency to his fentiments) was for fome time tainted 
j j 

D 3 



38 



with fuch c exploded opinions.* * Exploded 
opinions' have diftinguilhed many of the wifeft 
and the bed men this nation ever produced ; and 
though I lament the fufferings of my country 
from the neglect of thofe opinions, I allure the 
honorable gentleman, and this houfe, that there 
is nothing on which I lhould fo fteadily rely for 
the regard of good men, living, or of pofterity, 
when in my grave, as thofe very opinions which 
the votes of this houfe have enabled the honor- 
able gentleman to ftigmatize as ' exploded.' 

" In point of fa£t, however, the honorable gen- 
tleman, ftill furveying himfeif in the flattery of 
his own mirror, is wholly miftaken about thefe 
c exploded opinions ' It was to thefe - exploded 
opinions' that the negotiations of Paris and Lille 
are attributable. V\ e gave ftrong reafons in 
this houfe for peace. The public thought with 
us: and we have his own words, that he en- 
tered upon that treaty only in compliance with 
what he now calls ' exploded opinions.' 



" But the honorable gentleman has a keen 
anxiety, left this houfe fhould not continue to 
think thefe opinions quite fo 'exploded;' for he 
afks, 'Will this houfe, by going into the pro- 
pofed inquiry, difgrace its former votes ?' To 
which I anfwer, 'Yes, certainly, if this houfe 
will fave the country.' In the very houfe of 
commons, to which I before alluded, the early 
fcene of the honorable gentleman's ' exploded 
opinions '—this very ftimulus to pride was urged, 
though without effe6t. That houfe, as well as 
this houfe, was queftioned, f Will you, the uni- 
fprm fupporters of this war againft America, dif- 



S9 



grace your former votes ? ' But, fir, they did 
difgrace their former votes; and, by fo doing, 
they did honor to themfelves, and faved their 
country. That parliament was a retracing and 
a recanting parliament. Bitter as it was, the 
draught was fwallowed ; and 1 have no hefita- 
tton in faying, that this houfe, to refcue this 
country, if that indeed be poffible, from the 
perils in which that honorable gentleman has 
involved it, mud tread in the footfteps of its pre- 
deceflor in 1782 — and, by renouncing the ho- 
no r able gentleman and his fyftem together, pre- 
ferve this country from its impending dangers. 

" Let it be obferved, by the way, that the good 
acceptance of the,honorable gentleman's opinions 
in this houfe, happens to have been fupported 
by the fubfidiary aid of all the power of this go- 
vernment. Poflefled of that little adjunct, he 
may double or treble the national debt, but he 
may be pretty fure, that his opinions will have 
a tolerable reception here. To efcape the odium 
of being 'exploded,' he may be certain there is 
no remedy fo effectual as his refuming his former 
office, or fhowing a perfect obfequioufnefs to 
thofe who are armed with its influence. 

" Now, fir, I come to the confideration of the 
late change of adminifiration. 

" Before I touch upon the others, allow me to 
fay, that with refpect to one of them, I do not 
think it would be eafy, if poffible, to find a man 
in the whole community better fuited to, or more 
capable of, the high office he fills, than the di- 
ftinguifhed perfon at the head of the admiralty: 

D 4 



40 



I mean of courfe, and can mean no other than, 
the Earl of St. Vincent; — but beyond him, 
I own, I do not feel myfelf able to fay one word 
that can be very agreeable to any individual of 
all the remainder. . 

"As to the mere change, it is true that no change 
can be for the worfe ; for I defy the evil genius 
of the country to pick out an equal number of 
men from any part of England, whofe meafures 
could, in the fame length of time, reduce the 
country to a more deplorable ftate than that in 
which the retired minifters have left it. But 
was there no alternative for the country between 
them and their exatt fuccefibrs P I feel this to 
be a very unpleafant part of this night's un- 
avoidable difcuffion: — in matters of importance, 
however, delicacy mud give place to duty. The 
late chancellor of the exchequer, not perhaps 
quite freely from redundancy, has blended, with 
his panegyric of the honorable gentleman over 
againft me (Mr. Addington), a gaudy picture 
of the importance of the chair which you, fir, 
occupy. I agree that the office of fpeaker is 
a high and honorable ftation. It is certainly the 
firft dignity in this houfe ; and I fuppofe it was 
merely for the public good, that both your pre- 
deceffors defcended from that altitude to infe- 
rior places, but happening to be, at the fame time, 
fituations of infinitely more emolument and 
power. A man, however, may be an excellent 
chairman of this houfe, as the late fpeaker un- 
doubtedly was, without being exactly qualified 
for the office of chancellor of the exchequer. At 
the prefenr moment this is all that I think ne- 
ceflary to fay regarding the .refpeftable and 



41 



honorable gentleman whom you, fir, have fuo 
ceeded. 

<c The next in importance, both of office and 
character, is the noble lord upon the oppofile 
bench (Lord Hawkesbury), who has richly 
fhared thofe florid praifes the honorable 
gentleman (Mr. Pitt) has poured fo fluently 
upon the ' whole body of his fucceflbrs. I 
aflure the noble lord that I have as much refpect 
for him as I can have for any perfon, whom I, 
perfonally, know fo little. He has been, it is 
true,. as the honorable gentleman has faid, a mem- 
ber of this houfe'for many years, and, I doubt 
not, a very diligent member; — but if you had 
polled the country, not an individual could be 
found in it lefs happily felecied for the peculiar 
department he occupies, than the noble lord ; — the 
noble lord who, in whatever elfe he may furpafs 
them, does not yield even to any one of thofe 
whom he officially fucceeds in the virulence of 
his obloquies upon the French revolution ; who 
has fpent as many hours in this houfe as any 
member of the late or prefent minilrry, in mowing 
the irredeemable infamy of treating with c that 
republic of regicides and aflaffins.' Never, fure, 
was there a worfe calculated propofer of peace 
to Parts, than the very noble lord who was for 
cutting the matter quite fhort, and marching off 
hand to that capital. 

" What then is this country to expecl? — a 
change of fyftem? No: for all that the public 
have learnt upon this fubje6l is this, that the new 
minifters are come in, diftinclly and exprefsly 
to fupport the fyftem of the former; with this 



42 



tingle exception (which makes any hope of etia- 
blilhing the tranquillity of the country recently 
united to us, wholly defperate), that they are 
hoftile to the only meafure of their predeceflbrs 
which has any pretention to wifdom and good 
policy. 

<c Before I proceed to the conclution of this part 
of my fubjecT, I muft beg leave to fay fomething 
upon this much-talked of fubjett. of Catholic 
Emancipation. 

cc As to the mere word ' emancipation,* I 
agree with the honorable gentleman (Mr. 
Pitt), that the expreftion is not the beft ad- 
apted to the cafe. It is not ' emancipation,' 
in the ordinary meaning of the term, that the 
Catholic wants, or that the government can 
grant ; it is the removal of the civil difabi- 
lities that remain, and that remain for no end 
of either fecurity, of policy, or of prudence — in- 
fulting and vexatious diflinctions, beneficial to 
no intereft whatever — but the fruitful fource of 
jealoufy, difcord, and national weaknefs. The 
honorable gentleman talks of the king's reign 
having been a feries of concetiions to the Ca- 
tholics : — the king's reign is marked by no con- 
cetiions which the blamelefs conduct, of the Ca- 
tholics was not calculated to exact from the 
moil unwilling government in the world. He 
talks of what has been given to the Catholics : — 
Sir, you give them nothing while you deprive 
them of a right to tit in this houfe. I know of 
no political rights which ought not to be com- 
mon to all the king's fubjecis, and I am fure 
that a fyftem of profcription 3 on account of 



43 



theological differences, will for ever be foun4 
not more unjuft and abfurd, than pernicious. 
If this principle needed illuftration, Ireland 
affords it beyond the power of controverfy. Di^ 
vided by the government, it prefents a conftant 
temptation to your enemy. Rebellion is the 
fruit of bad policy, and invasion is encouraged 
by difunion. 

" In mentioning the name of Lord Fitzwil- 
liam (fc ftrangely quoted by an honorable gen- 
tleman as having contributed to the misfortunes 
of Ireland by his propofal regarding the Ca- 
tholics^, though I am eager to avow my partia- 
lities for that noble perfon, it is not from private 
friendihip or perfonal regards that I call upon 
any really candid man, to deny, if he is able, 
upon his honor and confcience, that the fyftem 
introduced by that noble lord would not, if then 
adopted, have prevented thofe dreadful fcenes of 
havoc, murder, and devaluation, which have 
fince defolated that wretched country. Let it 
for ever be remembered, that (with all the in- 
duftry which has been employed in making up 
the reports of the Irifli lords and commons upon 
thefe fubjec"ts) not a veflige of evidence appears, 
but the direct contrary, that any approach was 
made to feek afliftance from France, or that even 
the moft diftant idea of feparation from, or fetting 
up for independence of this country, was enter- 
tained in Ireland, until every petition for peaceful 
redrefs of grievances was fpurned and rejected. 

" But, fir, this concelllon, to which a few 
years fince (when, in my full belief, it would 
have prevented all the calamities that have fince 



44 



happened) the honorable gentleman was fo de- 
termined an enemy, and of which he is now, it 
feems, a martyr, was to have been, in his hands, 
accompanied with God knows what guards and 
qualifications. The apprehenfions, I think all fuch 
wholly chimerical — But no matter — Whatever 
apprehenfions to church or date the fearful or 
the zealous might entertain, to the grant of this 
Catholic claim, were all to be compofed and 
done away, by the healing, wholefome, tran- 
quillizing plan of the honorable gentleman ; 
and after raifing our expectation to the higheft 
pitch in favor of this choice fcheme, this choice 
fcheme, he tells us, muft be locked up in his 
own bread. 

" New, that the honorable gentleman fhould 
not impart his project to us, at this fide, whofe dif- 
]ike to it he anticipates, is nothing ; — but, that he 
fhould refolve to* keep this houfe* and the public, in 
total ignorance of this molt wife and perfect 
iydem, is utterly unaccountable. The honorable 
gentleman's deady determination, to hide from 
the world this piece of excellence, reminds me of 
a faying of Mr. Burke, who, in his fine drain of 
ridicule, obferved, that if torture were ever to 
be juftified, it was when a man refufed to reveal 
what he aflerted would be a mighty benefit to 
mankind. Torture had of late been liberally ap- 
plied to extort the confeffion of evil ; and, if one 
could give the honorable gentleman credit for 
the juft grounds of his egotifm, it would ajmoit 
tempt a wifh, that he were compelled to duclc-ie 
this bievTed fecret. So obdurate is he upon this 
point, that he not only fears his lipsagainft fuch 
a happy difclofure, and proclaims his det; 



45 



nation not to introduce, in bis own perfon, any 
queftion upon this fubjecl, but be absolutely for- 
bids the houfe from difcuffing it, by declaring, 
that fuch difcuilion will not be ufelefs merely, 
but mifchievous. It is not, however, to this part 
of the bufinefs alone that the honorable gentle- 
man's myfteries are confined ; every thing con- 
nected with it is to be fhrouded in filence and 
concealment. After avowing very fairly, fo far, 
(thqugh not the direct composition) the fenfe 
and fpirit of the paper diffufed through Ireland 
in his name; and after owning that his inabi- 
lity to propofe his Catholic regulations, as a mi- 
nijler, was alone the caufe of his reflgning his 
office, — the honorable gentleman protefts againft 
further explanation. c No further avowal or 
denial (hall be drawn from him either now or 
hereafter. ' This fure is the moll extraordinary 
declaration that ever fell from the lips of a pub- 
lic man. The honorable gentleman refigns his 
office becaufe he cannot propofe his meafure. 
To Ireland he fends his fentiments, as they are 
conveyed by a friend of his, in the paper alluded 
to. He defcribes his plan to this houfe as the 
perfection of all wifdom ; and upon all thefe 
points he defies interrogatory, and deprecates 
comment. 

<c The honorable gentleman afks — c Is it won- 
derful that the fovereign ihould have an opinion ? 
No certainly j — and if the honorable gentleman 
did not make himfelf acquainted with his fo- 
vereign's opinion, upon this point, long before 
the propofed introduction of his meditated [y- 
ftem, he was guilty of a breach of duty. In 
what poflible way can the honorable gentleman 
be exculpated from the charge of grofs irreve- 



46 



rence to the king, or of abuiing fo many millions 
of bis people ? He denies that any pofitive 
pledge was given to the Catholics at the union ; 
but admits that it was natural for them to cherifh 
expectation from it. Natural ! — Why, unlefs 
they reafoned very deeply indeed upon the ho- 
norable gentleman's mind, fuch an expectation 
was inevitable. In the nature of things they 
muft have looked upon it as a certainty. 

" I fhall fay nothing of the other means employ- 
ed to accomplifh the union \ — but, in refpecl 
to the operation of the Catholic queflion upon 
that meafure, I can eafily conceive that if any 
friend of the Catholics, fuppofing my relation 
the Duke of Leinjler, or any other perfon well 
afFe£ted to their caufe, or any of the leading 
Catholics themfelves, mould have been confulted 
by the honorable gentleman, what can be fo 
Jikely as that the honorable gentleman mould 
hint in private, what he has fo diftinctly dated 
in public, namely, that the fhorteft, fureft courfe 
to the attainment of their objects would be, 
their fupport of that meafure, from the adop- 
tion of which, alone., thofe conceflions could 
flow which were fo often refufed by provincial 
prejudice, ignorance, and injuftice. Upon the 
other hand, I cannot perceive any thing more 
probable than that the reluctance of thofe early 
enemies to the union, who are, at the fame time, 
fuch infuriated terrorifts in favor of Proteftant 
afcendancy, had been fubdued by affurantes 
that an Imperial Parliament alone could raife a 
barrier fufficiently powerful to beat back the 
claims of the Catholics, fo often, and fo likely 
to be often preferred in the parliament of that 
country. It appears to me that nothing could 



47 



be at once more likely, and more like a pledge, 
than all this, when thofe public declarations of 
the honorable gentleman are remembered, which 
left no rcferve upon this— that for either giving 
or rejecting the Catholic claim, the juftice to 
fee! it, the liberality to grant it, and the ftrength 
to fecure it to the one feci, without mifchief to 
the other, could be expe&ed in a general 
parliament of the Empire — and in that alone. 

" That both parties in Ireland are difcontented 
and difgufted cannot be otherwife than too true. 
To the Prcteftant zealot there is no fecurity, 
or fatisfa&ion to the Catholic claimant. Such 
is the honorable gentleman's infelicity upon this 
great queftion, that the meafure which was to be 
the remedy becomes the fource of all diftempers. 
Inftead of quieting, he has agitated every heart 
in that country. The epoch from which was 
to begin the reign of comfort and confidence, 
of peace and equity and juftice, is marked 
even in its outfet, by the eltablifliment of that 
which refts every civil bleffing upon the caprice 
of power. Ul-flarr'd race ! to whom this vaunted 
union was to be the harbinger of all happinefs; 
and of which the firlt fruit is martial law, — -or, in 
other words, the extinguishment of all law 
whatfoever! 

" The fituation of the king and of this houfe, 
upon the fubjecl, is quite unexampled. His 
majefty's prerogative is clear and undoubted to 
change his fervants, to give or to refufe his afTent 
to every law ; but it is a grofs breach of the 
privileges of this houfe, and a deep violation of 
the conftitution, to ufe the king's name for the 
purpofe of influencing its deliberations. Here 



48 



is not only an introduction of the king's naiite^ 
but a declared incapacity to propofe a falutary 
fyftem on account of objections which the con- 
fiitution of the country, and the undoubted rights 
of this houfe, will not allow to be even mentioned 
or hinted at. Sir, I refpect the monarchical part 
of this Government ; but the monarch has nothing 
to do with the fentiments of a member of par- 
liament: and for the wonders of thefe times was 
referved a public declaration within thefe walls 
coming from high authority, — that a plan of 
acknowledged benefit cannot be propofed here, 
unlefs it comes recommended from the crown, 
of which, by the conftitution of the country, it 
fhould be the peculiar genius of this houfe to be 
wholly independent ! 

" This fure is a flrange ftate of things ; and 
every thing connected with it is of the fame 
character. As a rights the honorable gentleman 
denies the claim of the Catholics. He would 
give them nothing as a right — but he thinks the 
conceffion expedient. This, fir, is not my fenfe of 
the Catholic claim. I would grant it, not 
merely becaufe it is expedient, but becaufe it 
is juft. Thofe who prefs the doctrine of virtual 
reprefentation, to the utmoft lengths, never ven- 
tured to carry it fo far as even to pretend that 
it extended to the privation of the Catholic 
body. Catholics, in my opinion, have rights as 
well as Proteftants. They have both rights con- 
jointly j not refting upon light or frail grounds, 
but forming the very bafe and foundation of 
our civil fyftem ; and the government which does 
not acknowledge thefe rights, the rights of man 
in the ftricteft (^n(Q of the word, (notwithfland- 
ifag the conftant clamour againll, and abufe of, 



49 



that phrafe) not as theories and fpeculations, but 
as active and living principles, is not, and cannot 
be, a legitimate government. 

cc The inferences to be drawn from the ftyle of 
argument which has been ufed in defence of 
the duration of thefe dreadful laws in Ireland, 
furnifh a fentence of condemnation againft the 
government of that country, much ftronger than 
any that was ever ufed by thofe who, fo unavail- 
ingly, raifed their voices againft a fyftem of ter- 
ror, of free quarters, of conflagration, and torture. 
If it be true, as they allege, that treafon has 
tainted that people to the bone — if the poifon 
of jacobinifm, as they call it, pervades the whole 
mind of the multitude — if didoyalty is fo rooted 
and fo univerfal, that military defpotifm can alone 
make the country habitable — it would be againft 
the experience of the world that fuch a wide and 
deadly difaffe&ion could, or ever did, exift in any 
nation on the globe, except from the faults of 
its governors. 

<c To this country too — to England, what a 
contradiction is the conduct of thefe honorable 
gentlemen to their profeflions ! This nation was 
to reap marvellous bleffings from the union ; but 
of what benefit is the junction of four or five 
millions of traitors ? Such, the laws propofed by 
thefe honorable gentlemen tell you, the Irifh 
are; — but fuch I tell you they are not. A groffer 
outrage upon truth, a greater libel upon a ge- 
nerous people, never before was uttered or in- 
sinuated. They who can find reafon for all this, 
in any fuppofed depravity of the Irifh, totally 
mifunderftand their character. Sir, I love the 

£ 



50 

Irifli nation. I know a good deal of that people. 
I know much from having (ecn it ; I know more 
from private friendship with individuals. The 
Irifli may have their faults like others. They 
may have a quick feeling of injury, and not be 
very patient under it ; but I do affirm, that, of 
all their characleriftics, there is not one feature 
more predominant, in every clafs of the country, 
from the higheft to the lowed order, than gra- 
titude for benefaction, and fehjibility to kindnefs. 
Change your fyftem towards that country, and 
you will find them another fort of men. Let impar- 
tiality, juflice, and clemency, take place of pre- 
judice, oppreffion, and vengeance, and you will 
not want the aid of martial law, or the terror of 
military execution. 



" Having said so much upon the affairs 
of Ireland, let me recur to what I before urged 
regarding this new miniftry. It is not that the 
change is for the worfe upon the whole, for no 
change can be fo ; — but, let me afk you, what is 
it that the public can expect from men, whofe 
fundamental principle is adherence to that fyftem 
of their predeceffors, which has brought this 
empire into its prefent circumftances ; and whofe 
only novelty, or deviation from that fyftem, con- 
lifts in their repugnance to the only meafure of 
thofe whom they have fucceeded, that has a.nv 
pretenfion to good policy ? Not fo, they will 
anfwer ; ' the fyftem was mod wife.' Well, be it 
fo ; this c wife fyftem* has reduced this country to 
the ftate in which it is at this moment involved r 
tell me how you intend to get us out of the 
danger. By the very means that got us in, fe 



51 



the inevitable inference.— Do you try no change 
of fyftem ? No; by no means; we go the 
beaten courfe. — Is there nothing new in your 
plan ? Yes ; our predecefifors defigned to re- 
ftore four millions of our fellow-fubjecrs to the 
rights of the conftitution. This we refufe. In 
all things elfe we follow their example. 

" Such is this new miniftry — and fuch the ob- 
vious hope from their appointment. 

" Upon the queftion with the Northern powers, 
the noble Lord (Hawkesbury), if rumor err 
not, has been as high-toned and intraclable 
in his official communications as even his 
' vigorous' predeceflbr. Refpe&ing France, the 
whole country could not afford a felection of 
men fo calculated to excite diftruft, and fugged 
argument a ad homines. If any thing could juftify 
the fporting with human life, never, fure, was 
occafion more apt of retorting the infulting folly 
made to Bonaparte's moft conciliating propo- 
fals of laft year. With how good a grace might 
he not anfvver, ' With you I cannot treat — you 
are but newly in the porTeffion of a doubtful 
power' — ' I muft have experience and the evi- 
dence of fads' — • You have called me a child 
and champion, and fometimes a puppet :' c You 
are the children and champions of thofe whom I 
have covered with indelible difgrace.' — " How do 
I know that 1 can place the lead reliance upon 
any treaty made with men who, indeed, may be 
mere puppets, moved by wires, in the hands of 
others?' Thus might Bonaparte caft back 
upon this government the abfurd impediments 

E 2 



52 



that were railed againft any negotiation with 
him in January, 1800 : — but I believe him to be 
much too wife and too good a man ; too fenfible 
of that which conftitutes his trueft glory, the de- 
fire of giving a durable peace to the world'; to 
refort to fuch objections, or defcend, upon fo 
important a fubject, to repeat their words, whofe 
examplehehas fcorned in fo many other inttances. 
O ! what a contrail is his conduct, "to that of 
the gentlemen over againft me ! 

" To the reiterated importunities of this fide of 
the houfe, in favor of negotiation, they have re- 
plied alternately in this ftyle. When beaten, 
' What/.faid they, '-will you treat now and di- 
fpirit the country ? — is the moment of defeat the 
time for negotiation ?' Not fo Bonaparte. Even 
in the ftate to which the Directory reduced 
France— even before he drew the fvvord from 
the fcabbard, he humbled himfelf, (if the noble 
wiih of (lopping the effufion of human blood 
could indeed be humility) to reconcile thofe 
honorable gentlemen to the reftoration of the 
world's tranquillity ; and it will be matter of 
curious reflection for after ages to obtexw z Juck 
a man as Bonaparte almoft upon his knees in 
fupplicatingy^t// conductors of war as thofe over 
againft me, for peace. In the crifis of fuccefs, 
when we implored t 1 em to take advantage of 
the victories of our fleets, they have replied, 
* What treat nozv, when we are fo near the ob- 
ject of the war ? Will you fully the glories of 
your navy?' But Bonaparte, who gained not a 
victory without making a propofal of peace, did 
not think that the glories of Marengo or Hohen- 



53 



linden were in danger of fading, (in truth, it 
makes them fhine with additional fplendor) from 
the conftant proffers of pacification made by him 
who never won a laurel without mowing the 
olive at the fame time. We, on this fide of the 
houfe, have been taunted with unnerving the 
people and undervaluing their refources, at the 
feveral epochs when, truly defcribing the 
country, we urged the other fide to peace. I am 
no advocate for defpondency, — and mould be 
the Jail perfon in the world to countenance a 
fentiment of defpair in either man or nation : 
but I am fure that the true road to ruin, for either, 
would be to fhut their eyes to the reality of their 
danger. How ftands that point with the rival 
government ? 

cc Did Bonaparte blink the difficulties of France? 
It is poflible that, with a view to enhance his 
own renown, he may have magnified, but it is 
quite certain that he did not underftate, its di- 
ftreffes of any fort. Far from it. He exhibited 
to his country a ftrong picture of national mi- 
fery ; and to roufe the energies of France to thofe 
extraordinary achievements which immortalife 
the fhort campaigns of the laft year, his pro- 
clamation was what ? — The anfwer of the gentle- 
men over againft me to his entreaties for peace. 

" Not all his conquefts — not all his fame — fo 
effectually recruited the thinned phalanxes of 
the French armies as that folemn appeal to the 
good fenfe of France, that ltimuius to revolu- 
tionary ardor, and to the proud paiTion of na- 
tional independence, — the ever notable reply of 
Lord Grenville to M. Talleyrand. Ma- 

E 3 



' 54 

rengo and Hohenlinden grew out of that famous 
paper. 

" To a frank but refpe&ful letter, addrefTed to 
the king of England, they fay c Reftore the 
Bourbons , — or, in other words, ( Go hangyourfelf. 
If you would give a fpeedy peace to France, re-in- 
ftate that family, whofe firft acr, in all probability, 
would be to bring yourfelf to the fcafTold.' — Bo- 
naparte was fo perverfe and ftrange a man, that 
he rejected this good advice, and would not 
confent to his own deftruction and dishonor, by 
replacing France under that tyranny from which 
the revolution freed her, and which nine years 
of unheard-of fufferings and of martial prowefs, 
without example in hiftory, had been confecrated 
to annihilate. 

"The honorable gentleman (Mr. Pitt) feemed 
to kindle at the fuppofed charge of making the 
reftoration of monarchy a fine qua non of peace. 
Had that charge been really urged, I leave any 
man to judge whether the means of fupporting 
it are not abundantly fupplied by Lord Gren- 
ville's memorable difpatch ; but, though he 
tells us that we are callous to the refutation, 
the honorable gentleman, in fact, is combating 
a fhadow, for that is not the charge. A total 
failure of all the declared objects of the war, of 
which the refforation of monarchy was one of 
the foremoft, is the charge we make ; a charge 
which he has not anfwered and cannot anfwer; 
and if the honorable gentleman cannot diltinguifh 
between a motive to war, and ajine qua non of 
peace, he mud have left his underftanding be- 
hind him in his office. 



55 



We accufe him of ruining the houfe of Au- 
ftria ; and we fay that his conduct could have no 
other tendency, and, in the nature of things, 
could have no other ejfecl. When, in the corre- 
fpondence with M. Otto, a naval armiftice was 
re f; fed (rightly refuted perhaps, and perhaps 
reafonably demanded in the triumphant iituation 
of France — 1 am not entering into that queftion), 
as the condition to joint negotiation with Au- 
ftria, M.Otto fays/that the firft conful, though 
he will admit no EngJifh minifter to Luneville, 
is ready and willing to enter into a feparate 
.ireatv with this country. The honorable 
gentleman evades this propofal by pleading 
good faith to an ally, which ally deprecates his 
pretended and pernicious fidelity. The honor- 
able gentleman rejects the only terms on which 
he could reafonablv hope to ferve the emperor, 
and exacts the ilrict fulfilment of the emperor's 
engagement * not to make a feparate peace 
before a given time.' Unwarned by Marengo 
and Hohenlinden, — untaught by the fkill and 
perfection with which that vatr line of operations, 
extending from Nice to Fvjentz, had been con- 
ducted in the fatal experiment of the preceding 
furnnier, — the honorable gentleman (lands upon 
the due and forfeit of his treaty ; and, as if the 
letter of this treaty, the wealth of England, and 
every other instigation by which he could o-oad 
on this devoted prince had not been fufficient, 
he tells this houfe and the world, that, * as &fpec- 
iator, even as a fpectator, he would advife the 
emperor to go on-* felecting this word, as if his 
evil genius prompted it, for the purpofe of illuf- 
trating the difference between eloquence and 

E 4 



56 

" Now mark what followed. 

<e All the flaughter that deluged the earth, from 
the Mincio to the Meine, a fucceffion of conftant 
victories, day after day, till even Hohenlinden it- 
felf is furpafled by the convention, or rather the 
capitulation of Steyr; and the head of the houfe 
of Auftria owing his crown to the clemency, 
the forbearance, and magnanimity of that per* 
fon, with whom thefe over againft me have fo 
often faid it would be atrocious and foolifh to 
negotiate. The honorable gentleman's filence, 
* as a fpectator,' having had a full trial, a fepa- 
rate peace is figned at Luneville, and the two 
hundred and fifty millions fterling, and the hun- 
dreds of thoufands of Britifh lives facriflced, in 
order to overthrow the republican government, 
and abafe the power of France, all terminate in 
a treaty which regulates and decides the def- 
tinies of the other great powers of Europe, with- 
out this countrv being fo much as named in it. 

JO 

All this wafte of wealth, of human life, and na- 
tional honor, flnifh in the peace of Luneville, in 
which Great Britain is lefs thought of and re- 
garded, than the pooreft, pettieft prince in the 
whole empire of Germany. 

" All this paffes without a murmur; and the 
country, with a fottifh iiupidity, fees that, like 
every ether opportunity for reftoring peace, go by 
in lilence and ftupor. Can all this be chance? 
— \^ hat ! mere chance — that every, every fea- 
fonable moment fhould be loft, and every fuc- 
ceedirg epoch for reftoring the country to peace, 
fhould bring with it new and augmented difad- 
vantages, growing in exacl proportion to the du- 
ration of the war! 



57 



" You refufed peace at Paris, at Lifle, and twice 
in 1800. Then give us better terms now, or 
anfwer to your country for throwing thofe away 
which you might have then had. 

" Is the lofs, for ever, of all thefe opportunities 
nothing but miftakes — mere venial errors? — 
Sir, they are high crimes againft the well-being 
of this country ; and we (late them as fuch. We 
date them not upon aflertion, but fact ; grant us 
the inquiry this motion afks for, and we {hall 
prove them. Aware of fuch an effect, what is 
the honorable gentleman's conduct ? 

<c All his dexterity is employed to (how this 
houfe that it will be giving itfelf, as it were, a 
flap on the face, if it adopt this motion ; and he 
makes to his friends a moft pathetic appeal upon 
grounds purely perfonal. Confcious that in- 
quiry will ruin him, he urges the pride, the con- 
fiftency, the feeling of the houfe to reject my 
honorable friend's motion ; and he warns his 
noble relation (Lord Temple) to fpare his 
compliments, if he withhold his vote — inquir- 
ing into his conduct, he avows, is the word feiv 
vice his friends can render him. Sir, undoubtedly 
this is, fo far, the truth, that a fair and honeft 
inquifition would be his overthrow ; and his 
conduct this night is a perfect comment upon his 
life. But is it thus with men who dread not 
investigation ? The name of Lord Fitzwil- 
liam has been mentioned. 

" When a great queftion of flate, affecting (as 
in the refult has too fatally appeared) the peace of 
a whole nation, was at iffue between that noble 
lord and the honorable gentleman's govern- 



58 



ment, how did Lord Fitzwilliam act r Did 
he fkulk under the fuppofed fympathies of par- 
liament ? Did he fay, Don't bury me dnder 
compliments, if you vote for inquiry ? No, fir, 
that noble lord, in his place in the other houfe, 
provoked, demanded, and challenged inquiry; 
and it is in the memory of manv now present, 
that there was not, in this houfe, one perfon 
connected with that noble lord, by private 
friendfhip, or by any other tie or intercourfe, 
who did not vote for going fully into that trans- 
action. Not fo the honorable gentleman, be- 
caufe he is confcious of no fuch caufe. This 
houfe rejected that motion, the adoption of which 
might have prevented the miferies that have 
iince intervened. May God avert fimilar con- 
fequences from fimilar conduct this night! 

Cf If the honorable gentleman can continue to 
perfuade this houfe againft the revifion of his 
conduct, I do not wonder that he mould have feized 
the opportunity (afforded to him by an incident 
not too common in his hiftory) of refigning the 
government into the hands of his friends. The 
honorable gentleman near him (Mr. Dundas), 
after telling the houfe an entertaining rtory of 
Charles the Second, fneers at us, and fays he 
has not heard of any prayers offered up for our 
fucceeding to their places. — Has the honorable 
gentleman heard of any prayers offered up for 
their return to them ; or, in any part of the 
kingdom has there been a regret expreffed at 
their retreat? Perhaps it would be nearer the 
truth to fay, that no joy was more general, till 
that feeling was damped by the fufpicion, that 
the change of rniniilry was, in reality, no change 



59 



at all. But the honorable gentleman (Mr. Pitt) 
has taken infinite pains to contradict this notion, 
and laboured very affiduoufty to prove that it 
was, in good footh, a true change, and no jug- 
gle. c Is office/ he afks, • a thing, that people 
are generally eager to lay down?' Undoubtedly, 
in that refpe6t> nothing is more eafy than to as- 
certain the honorable gentleman's difpofition, 
materials for deciding it being amply afforded 
by his hiftory; and if the world really trunk?, 
that he has relinquifhed the government mere]/ 
becaufe he found impediments to a wife and 
hcneft meafure, then the honorable gentleman 
has the full effect of his character. It, however, 
is indifputable, that no politician in England, 
up to this period, has difcovered lefs alacrity in 
parting with his place. 

" Still more, to prove that the recent change 
as no impofture, he fcems to lament that, being 
Jo near the end of his labours, he fhouid be forced 
to yield to circumftances, and not be himfelf the 
perfon to terminate this glorious career; — he 
grieves at not being in at the death > as it were. 
Now, fir, what tingle object of the war the ho- 
norable gentleman has gained, or (except in his 
departure from office) what reafon he has for 
concluding that this conteft is near its clofe, he 
leaves us in utter ignorance. 

" Whence does he draw his conclufion ? Are 
the points for which this government contended 
more likely to be attained at pre fen t than they 
were at Paris or at Lifle ? Are you more 
jikely to get the retloration of the Low Countries, 
which you fo judicioufly made a fine qua non of 



60 

the former negotiation, at this time than at that? 
Or, putting that matter quite out of fight, are 
you nearer to any other national purfuit now than 
then ? Are you ftronger ? Is France weaker ? 
What is it, I aik, that feeds the honorable 
gentleman's fancy into a notion that the end of 
this war is fo near at hand ? 

cc As to the late change of his majefty's fervants, 
It is impoffible for me to fay whether it is a jug- 

fle or not ; but, eonfidering the genius of the 
onorable gentleman's contrivances, I can fee 
many things in fuch a fcheme which would 
make it not unfuitable for him, to hazard fuch 
a thing as an experiment. Blinded he would be, 
and under hopelefs infatuation, not to fed the 
total impoiribility of his ever reaching that goal 
at which he calls fuch a lingering look. I do 
not exactly charge him with avowed duplicity in 
conducting the different treaties which be opened 
with the enemy — but that he was grateful, even 
to piety, for the mifcarriage of them all, is not to 
be denied. When, then, was he to be fuccefs- 
ful or fincere, who never negotiated without 
failing, and never failed without rejoicing ? Not 
one lingle ftep could he take towards pacifica- 
tion, without ftumbling upon fomething that 
muft fuggefr. to him his own humiliation, and 
without prompting the enemy with perpetual 
miftruft. Well, therefore, may the honorable 
gentleman pour forth his panegyrics upon his 
fucceflors, who take this tafk (fo ignominious for 
htm and his colleagues) oif his hands, and who, 
at the fame time, proclaim their devotion to the 
principles of his adminiftration. 'There is no 
myftery,- he allures us. c in his refignation : why 



61 

fhould it excite fufpicion ? — Is it necefTary for 
a minifter, quitting his office, to date the reafons, 
or complain of the caufes, that led to it ? Thefe 
appeals have been made/ he tells us, ' by re- 
tired or difcarded minifters, and often reforted to 
as a means of reindatement.' — In the judgment 
of fome men, a drain of fycophancy may be as 
efficacious a method. 

" I know not whether all the reafons given 
by the honorable gentleman can fatisfy the pub- 
lic, that the late change has been what he fo 
flrenuoufly contends it was ; but of this I am 
quite fure, that to that public it is of very little 
confequence ; for although the perfons "recently 
put into the offices of government can, with, 
fomewhat of lefs difgrace than their predeceffors, 
propitiate the government of France, yet it ap- 
pears to me an extravagant ftretch of hope, that 
they, who are only known to the world as the 
followers, and who profefs themfelves the pupils 
of the late govern ment, can ever redore this em- 
pire to tranquillity and fafety — to peace abroad 
and to concord at home. 

<c With regard to this inquiry, the honorable 
gentleman fays, that it has been the cuftom of 
this houfe to refufe fuch committees, unlefs in 
very extraordinary emergencies. Now, fir, 
though we have, in my opinion, made out an 
impregnable f cafe of emergencies,' not only 
* extraordinary/ but wholly unprecedented; yet 
I affirm, in direct contradiction to the honorable 
gentleman, that the cuftom of this houfe has been 
the diametrical reVerfe of what he dates it. The 
cuftom of this houfe has been, not to refufe, but 



62 



to grant, fuch committees. To grant them has 
been the rule, to refufe them the exception, 
until the blelTmgs of that honorable gentleman's 
adminiftration had been inflicted upon this land. 
He is the only minifter that ever lived in this 
country — he is the fmgle man who made the 
denial of fuch committees his invariable maxim. 
You will find, upon your journals, a feries of 
proofs in fupport of my affertion ; and nothing 
in favour of the honorable gentleman, but 
fome folitary inftance that goes to eftablifli 
the generality of the practice, inftead of mak- 
ing againft it. So fettled has been this point, 
as a matter very much of courfe, in national 
difficulties, that the adoption of their propo- 
rtions, to whom fuch committees are granted, 
is by no means a neceflary confequence. I fay 
this to quiet the alarms of any members who 
may be feared for the honorable gentleman's. 
{af^ty. It is perfectly competent for gentlemen 
to lay to their fouls the flattering unclion of 
fupporting my honorable friend's motion, and: 
afterwards rejecting his meafures, as refulting 
from the inquiry. 

<f I have frequently obtained from this houfe, 
committees on the flate of the nation, and the 
meafures I propofed in thofe committees have 
been repeatedly negatived. Both thefe things 
happened to me, and to this houfe, in the years 
1778 and 1780. Nay, fometimes the houfe, as 
in the year 1740, has voted committees on the 
Hate of the nation, without taking any llep what- 
ever after. I have faid more than enough, 
think, to fliow that our motion refls upon the 



63 



bed practice * of this houfe, and is bottomed 
upon precedent in its utmoft ftricinefs ; even if 
we had not eftablifhed, as I contend we have, a 
national exigence of fufficient magnitude to 
create a precedent. 



o' 



" Now, fir, having advanced all that I think 
necefiary to urge in fupport of my honorable 
friend's motion, I fhall beg leave to fay a fingle 
word upon a topic that has been feveral times 
alluded to in this debate, namely, my perfonal 
attendance in this houfe. 

<c It is not for me to anticipate the determi- 
nation of this houfe upon this night ; and if I 
fhall fee any reafonable grounds for thinking, 
that my regular appearance here c.'aa be really 
beneficial to the public, the public thai] have 
that benefit : — but if it is demonftrable, after the 
feas of blood that have been fhed, and the hun- 
dreds of millions wafted; — after fuch facrifice of 
treafure and of reputation, — after the failure of 
ail the profeffed objecls of this war, and after 
bringing immeafurable woes upon the country 
in confequence of it — after a feries of military 
enterprifes that excited the contempt, and, fome 
of them, the horror of Europe — after the lofs of 
all, and the ruin of many of our allies — -after 
feeing the enemy aggrandifed beyond all exam- 
ple, by the very efforts made to abafe him — 
after having abufed the matchlefs glories of our 
navy, from the true end of all judicable warfare, 
a fafeand honorable peace — after feeing the ninth 

* Mr. Addington, the new minifter and late fpeaker, in 
his fpeech, admitted the general courfe of pra&ice to be as 
Mr. Fox ftaled it. 



64 



year of this direful conteft advance us fo little to* 
wards its clofe, that we fee a hoft of new ene- 
mies commencing a new war, pregnant with 
mifchief whether we are victorious or vanquifh- 
ed — after all the infringements that have been 
made upon the Englifh- conftitutiou, and our 
bitter experience, that increafing the caufe is 
not the true remedy for difcontent — after all that 
we have feen in Ireland, and all that we (qq\ in 
England— if all thefe things go for nothing, and 
that the divifion of this night mould manifeft the 
fame determined confidence of this houfe in the 
executive government, and in that fyftem which 
has produced all thefe effects, whether admini- 
ftered by its fir ft leaders, or by their followers 
raifed from fecondary into fuperior offices — if 
that, fir, fhould be the obvious inference and 
fair conclusion from the votes of this night- 
then, fenfible of the perfect inutility of my exer- 
tions in this place, I fhould certainly feel myfelf 
juftined in exercifing my own difcretion, as to 
the degree of regularity with which I ihould at- 
tend this houfe. 

<f How this houfe feels I know not : how it 
will aft we ihail fliortly fee. It is for the houfe 
to refolve how it (hall beft difcharge its duty ; I 
am quite fatisfied that I have difcharged mine. 

" Thofe who think that what I have ftated 
are not evils, or arifmg from any defect of wif- 
dom, of vigour, of forefight, of prudence ; or of 
anv of the qualities that conftitute the eflentials 
to an able and capable government; but that 
they are only flips cf conduct; mere flaws of 
accident, affording no prefumption againft the 



65 



king's minifters, whom this houfe is conftituled 
not to control or call to account, but to fupport 
and juftify upon all occafions-^fuch perfons will, 
of co'urfe, vote againft this inquiry. On the 
other hand, thofe who think that the misfortunes 
brought upon the country by the late minifters 
are the neceffary confequence of original folly in 
the fchemes, and of imbecillity in the execution ; 
who think that the primary duty of this houfe 
is to guard the rights and protect the interefts of 
the people, — not to fawn upon power, and be 
guided in all things by thofe whom the king 
nominates as his fervants; who are of opinion 
that the dreadful ftate in which- the country finds 
itfelf is not more owing to the mifconduct of ad- 
miniftration than to the abfence from this houfe 
of that conftitutional jealoufy of the influence 
of the crown which ought to be the firft charac- 
teriftic of a houfe of commons, and from its uni- 
form difcountenance of all retrofpedtion and re- 
vifion — Thofe who think that the vice of the 
plans and principles that have brought the coun- 
try to its prefent iituation, is cruelly aggravated 
by that boundlefs confidence which this houfe 
has uniformly mown ; and which, inftead of de- 
terring from evil or doubtful projects by the feat 
of punifhment, operates as an encouragement to 
dangerous fpeculation, by the affurance of in- 
demnity and fafety — Thofe who think that this 
queftion ought not to depend upon regard to the 
late or to the prefent adminittration, to predi- 
lections or antipathies for that fide of the houfe 
or this, but folely on the true ft ate of the nation — 
Thofe who think that the reign of confidence 
has had full play — that the principle has been 
fairly tried and found wanting — who fee, in its 

F 



66 



/ad effe&s, that it is not more unconftitutional 
than impolitic — and who firmly believe, as I be- 
lieve, that the fhorteft and fureft method of re- 
deeming the country in the prefent crifis, is for 
this houfe to refort to the good old cuitoms of 
our anceftors — to refume in the word the 
jealous vigilance of the beft times — to prove to 
both king and people, that blind fubmiftion muft 
give way to zealous inquifition — and to manifeft 
that the fupport of government muft be accom- 
panied by inquiry into its condu£t. Thofe who 
think thus, will vote, as I fhall, for the motion 
of my honorable friend." 



After Mr. Fox fat down, the new minifter, 
Mr. Addington, made a fhort fpeech ; and 
the houfe was fo convinced and fatisfied, that 
they decided againft the inquiry, by 291 againft 
105. 



FINIS. 



APPENDIX, 



(N° I.) 
Treaty of Commerce with Russia in 1166, 



10th Article. — c < Permiflion to the fubjects of the two 
powers, to go, come, and trade freely with thofe 
ftates, with which one or other of the parties (hall 
then, or at any future period, be at war; pro- 
vided they do not carry military fores to the enemy. 
From this permiflion, places actually blocked up or 
befieged are alone excepted ; and, with the {ingle 
exception of military ftores, all forts of commodities 
may, without the leaf impediment, be tranfported to 
the enemies of either power," 6cc. &c. 

nth Article — Recapitulates " The military ftores 

which are excepted in the loth Article. Thefe 

. . confift of twenty-one different forts, all which ar« 

declared contraband, and not one of which is a naval 

fore or material of any kind whatever,'' 

F 2 



68 



Treaty between Great Britain and Holland in 
1674. 

lft Article — Secures " the mutual right of both 
powers to trade freely with each other's enemies •" — 
and fotne doubt appearing as to the extent of this 
right, an explanatory declaration is agreed-upon in 
about a year after ; negociated and iigned by Sir 
William Temple and eight Dutch commif- 
fi oners, bearing date, at the Hague, the 30th of 
December, 1675 ; viz, 

" We do by thefe prefents declare, that the true intent 
and meaning of the faid articles is, and ought to be, that 
ihips and veflels belonging to the fubjecls of either of the 
parties, can and might, not only pais, traffic, and trade 
from a neutral port or place, to a place In enmity with 
the other party, or from a place in enmity to a neutral 
place, but alfo from a port or place in enmity to a port 
or place in enmity with the other party, whether the faid 
places belong to one and the fame prince or ftate, or to 
feveral princes or ftates, with whom the other party is in 
war." 

(The right of trading to neutrals and enemies being 
guarantied by the ift and 2d article of the main treaty of 
the preceding year (1674), and fubfequently explained 
by the above declaration ; the 3d article recites the com- 
modities in which the fubje&s of the two powers mall 
not trade ; and 4th, thofe in which they may trade;) viz* 

3d Article — Recapitulates the contraband, confiding 
of about thirty different forts. 



69 

4th Article — Recapitulates the free trade, in which are 
thefe words : — " All kind of hemp, flax, and pitch ; 
ropes, fails, and anchors; alfo mafts and planks, 
boards and beams, of what fort of wood foever ; 
and all other materials requifite for the building or 
repairing (hips, fhall be wholly refuted amongft free 
goodsy even as all other wares and commodities, fo 
that the fame may be freely tranfported and carried 
by the fubje&s of both powers even unto places in 
enmity with either, except only places befieged, en- 
vironed, or inverted." 

On the other hand in the 

Treaty between Sweden and Oliver Cromwell, done 
in London, in 1656. 

2d Article — Makes " {hips of war" one of the arti- 
cles of contraband, and omits naval (lores. Crom- 
well, then at war with Spain, preffed the Swedifti 
ambaflador to make naval (lores contraband. The 
ambaflador evaded Cromwell's defire, by pleading 
that he had no inftructions to that effect • and Crom- 
well con Tented to ratify the faid ?.d article, fo ex- 
cluding naval (lores from contraband, only upon 
condition that 

" As long as the war with Spain continued, neither 
his Swedifh majefty nor his people (hall carry hemp, 
pitch, tar, cables, fail-cloths, or mafts, to any places in 
jhe dominion of Spain." 



F 3 



70 



Alfoy by the 2d Article of the Treaty between Eng- 
land and Denmark in 1670, 

" Ships or other neceflaries for the ufe of war" are 
comprehended in the lift of things which the contracting 
parties engage that their fubjects fhall not furnim to the 
enemies of each other, " fuch enemies being aggreflbrs." 

The words " other neceflaries of war," being very loofe 
and inexplicit, there was a convention in 1680 between 
the two courts, in which naval (lores are made contraband 
between England and Denmark, though recognized as 
innocent commerce between England and various other 
powers. As in the 

Treaty of commerce between England and France, 
iigned'only three years before the above convention, 
namely in 1677,. a ^ thefe things are declared innocent 
commerce in thefe words : 

4th Article. — u Hemp, flax, pitch, cordage, fails, an- 
chors, malts, boards ; wood wrought out of all 
forts of trees, and that ferve for the building of (hips, 
as for the repair of them ; thefe are free to be carried 
to any port in neutrality, to the port of an enemy, 
and from one port of an enemy to another, — towns 
befieged, blocked up, or inverted, only excepted." 

(Not to multiply inftances, it is clear from the above, 
that, in the words of Mr. Fox, ' every thing upon this 
fubje6t is the creature of convention.'] 

(N° II.) 

Upon the fubje£r. and mode of fearching merchant vef- 
fels, there feems one uniform principle, and one fyftem of 



71 

regulation between all the powers of Europe, viz. that 

no neutral Ihould do for an enemy what the enemy could 

not do for himfelf.— That the goods of an enemy, found 

in a neutral, are forfeited ; but nothing more is forfeited. — 

That neutrals ihould be furnifhed with certificates, or 

fafe conducts, as they are fully fet down in treaties between 

almoft all the powers of Europe. — That in cafe a neutral 

does not exhibit fuch fafe conducts or certificates, or there 

be any other jufi: and urgent caufe of fufpicion, a fhip is 

liable to fearch. 

As Thus: 

In the Treaty behveen England and Sweden in 
1661. 

" When the merchandize (hips or goods of either of the 
confederates or their fubjects ihall meet or be met in the 
open fea, in harbours, havens, countries, or other places 
whatfoever, by the men of war or privateers, or by the fub- 
jects and inhabitants of the other confcderate,after producing 
only their fafe conducts or certificates aforefaid, nothing 
further fhall be demanded of them, no inquiry whatfoever 
fhall be made into the goods, (hips, or men; much lefs 
{hall they be damaged or molefted, but (hall be freely let 
go, to profecute their voyage and purpofe. But if this 
folemn and ftated form of the certificate be not produced, 
or there be any other jufi; and urgent caufe of fufpicion 
why this (hip ought to be fearched, (which ihall only be 
deemed juftifiable in this cafe, and not other wife ;) then if 
the goods of the enemy are found in the ihips of the con- 
federate, that part only which belongs to the enemy ihall 
be made prize, and the other which belongs to the confe- 
derate ihall be immediately leflored." 



72 

. To the fame effect:, by the treaty of commerce between 
England and Holland concluded at London 1674, it is pro- 
vided in the 5th article : " If any fhip belonging to the 
fubje&s of the contracting parties mall in the open fea, or 
clfe where, meet any lhips of war belonging to the other 
power, the faid fhips of war fhall keep at a convenient 
diftance, and only fend out their boat; and it (hall be law- 
ful for them only with two or three men to go on board 
fuch merchant mips or veffels, that the pafsport or fea 
brief may be {hewn to them by the captain or mafter of 
fuch merchant (hip ; and the fhip which mall mew the 
fame mall freely pafs, and it mall not be lawful to molefr, 
fearch, divert, or detain the fame from her intended 
voyage." 

"With a view to abridgment, and to avoid unneceffary 
repetitions, the fubftance of the above is recited in almoft 
every treaty, where fearch is provided for ; the rules being 

" Firft — That contraband alone is forfeited. 

" Secondly — That fearch is to take place only upon 
lawful and urgent fufpicion. 

*' Thirdly — That the mips of war mail not come within 
a certain diftance of the trading mips, and fhall only fend 
two or three men a-board, to fee the paffes or certificates." 

(N° III.) 
Between the treaty of neutrality recently concluded by 
the powers of the North, and that of 1780, there is no 
material difference. As the articles of contraband vary 
between England and thofe powers refpeftively, this va- 
riation is provided for at the end of the 2d article of the 
new treaty of neutrality, which recites the ufual articles 
of contrabands, and then adds— 



73 

*' It is alfo hereby agreed, that the prefent article (hall 
be without prejudice to \hz particular ftipulations of former 
treaties with the powers at war, by virtue of which the 
things above mentioned are allowed or prohibited." 

TriE Regulations to the fubjects of the King of 
Sweden, annexed to the recent treaty of the Northern 
powers, confifi of fifteen articles. As denoting the good 
or evil mind of the neutral, towards the belligerent powers, 
thefe regulations are not unworthy of notice. The fear 
of dwelling this pamphlet too much diffuades the Reporter 
from inferting any more of them than the 2d article, 
which is in thefe words : 

" The captain of the neutral fhip mud be provided 
with all papers requifite and proper for his voyage. Of 
this kind are, a certiticate of the place where the vefTel 
was built ; an invoice; letter {hewing the cargo not con- 
traband ; Turkifh and Latin pafTports ; a certificate of 
the magiftrate of the place ; a pafs for the crew ; a copy 
@f the oath of the owner ; a charter party, with the fub- 
fcription of the freighter, the captain, and the perfon 
freighting the vefTel ; a manifeft with the like fubfcrip- 
t.ions, containing a lift of the different articles of the la- 
ding, and the condition of the intended voyage. " 

The 4th article prohibits the ufe of a foreign Hag, of 
falfe certificates, &c. And the whole body of the regu- 
lations (the due obfervance of which alone can entitle the 
trade fhip to the benefits of the league), feems fairly 
enough to guard againft frauds or abufe. 

(N° IV.) 

The reader cannot but have obferved, even from the 
foregoing extracts, that whatever doubts may exift re- 



74 

garding other matters, thefe two points are clear beyond 
all difpute, by the uniting concurrence of all the powers 
of Europe, — namely, that contraband in all cafes is for- 
feited, — that no right of navigation extends to blockaded 
places. 

Hear the words of Lord Cap.ysfort, the Engdifh 
ambaffadorat Berlin, to Count Kaugwitz, the Pruffian 
minifter, as extracted from his letter, dated November the 
15th, 1800. 

Lord Carysfort fays that 

'*• He has reafon to believe that the Pruffian (hip (the 
Triton) was laden with contraband goods ; — that it was 
captured by an Englilh man of war as it was entering 
into the Texel, that is to fay, into a port belonging to the 
enemies of his majefty ; and — that it was reftored as foon 
as the officer who had the charge of it could be informed 
of the orders of his fuperiors !" 

Such is the conduct to the king of Pruffia of thofe " fu- 
periors !" who could not trufl: Lord Whitworth to 
Copenhagen, without fending Admiral Dixon to the 
Categat, — and who fuperfeded Mr. Drummond by 
Lord Nelson. 

In two days after his firft letter, Lord Carysfort 
addreffes himfelf to Count Haugwitz, expreiTmg his 
aftonifhment at the march of Pruffian troops to Cux- 
haven, " notwithstanding," to repeat his lordfliip's words, 
" the complete fatisfaclion given to his Pruffian majefty on 
all thefe points." 

Does the reader remember the Count's anfwer to this 
reprefentative of the king of England, upon this " com- 
plete fatisfaclion r" 

" The Pruffian vefTel," replies Count Haugwitz, 
fi has, it is true, been reftored to its owner ; but the mode 



75 

of releafe was, in every refpeft, as irregular as the pro- 
ceedings which had previoufly taken place with refpect 
to it! 



i» 



(N° V.) 

Within nine days of Mr. Fox's giving thefe too pro- 
phetic opinions, an event occurred which fets hirn and 
his opponents in a point of contraft that (hould rivet the 
attention of the world. He fays, " Hold your arm, and 
try your pen. Victory cannot give you more than 
you may obtain by prudence. Granting that you reduce 
Denmark to the lowed flage of national degradation, 
that of apologizing for engaging in this league, what will 
you gain by it ? The claim will revive with the means 
of enforcing it." 

Mark, e contra, the conduct of minifters, and its re- 
fult. 

Extract from Sir Hyde Parker's Letter to the 
Governor of Cronenberg, dated the 21th of 
March, 1801. 

" From the hoflile tranfaclion of Denmark fending 
away his Britannic Majejly' 's char ge-a v> affaires, I am anx- 
ious to know whether you have received orders to fire 
upon the Britifh fleet as they pafs into the Sound ?" 

The Danish Governor's Answer, dated the 28th, 
(after inquiring of his Court.) 

" The King of Denmark did not fend away the charge- 
d'affaires : — he, upon his own demand, obtained a pafs- 
port. 



76 



ci In cafe your Excellency Jhould think proper to make 
any propofals to the King of Denmark, I wijli to he infor- 
med thereof, before the fleet approaches nearer to the 
cattle," &c. 

Then follows the battle in Copenhagen Roads, and a 
victory in favour of England ; which rauft be placed in 
the foremoft rank of naval glory, fince it added to the re- 
nown of even Lord Nelson. This victory, of which 
the Englifh language does not admit a grander defcription 
than 'that it had added to the renown of even Lord Nel- 
son,* terminates thus : 

'Extract of the 2d Article of the Convention, signed 
on the 9th of April, 1801, by Lord Nelson and 
the Danish Negociator. 

" The armed {hips of his Daniih majefty fhall remain 
in their prefent condition ; and the treaty of armed neu- 
trality ihall, fo far as concerns the active co-operation of 
Denmark, remain fufpended during this armiftice" ! !. ! ! ! 



MAY* 1801. 



HAMttTOX rRISTEIt. FStCON COC 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 






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